


Wandering Steps and Slow

by K_dAzrael



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Frottage, Gender Issues, Intercrural Sex, M/M, Minor Character Death, Psychological Trauma, Robot Sex, Sex Work, catalogue shopping for genitals
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-25
Updated: 2018-08-05
Packaged: 2019-05-28 13:45:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 33,927
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15050420
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/K_dAzrael/pseuds/K_dAzrael
Summary: "Listen, no-one at the precinct is going to have a problem with the gay thing, but you have to be aware of how it looks – you know, with him specifically.”“What’s wrong with him?”“He’s your freaking evil twin.”"We are not actually related – you know that, right? We were made in the same basic template but I don’t share any genetic material with him. It’s no different than if I was to associate with an AX400 or a WR600 – at least not to an android.” Connor frowns. “I’m just going to ignore that you called him evil.”





	1. Chapter 1

**2040**

Connor sits down at his workstation and looks over at the adjoining desk. The space is littered with dirty coffee cups and donut cartons, notes Hank has written to himself that are curse-laden reminders to follow up on leads, but the lieutenant himself is absent. Connor glances up at the precinct clock and puts his hand on the phone in his pocket, drumming his fingertips restlessly on the back of its casing as he considers the merits of calling Hank versus letting him sleep. Hank doesn’t like it when Connor goes off to work a case without him – he seems to consider Connor to be vulnerable when unaccompanied ( _damn foolhardy_ is how he puts it). However, he also doesn’t like to be woken – if he was late to bed it was either drinking or poring over files.

Before Connor can pull his hand from his pocket, the phone rings. He answers with his standard greeting: “Android-Human Crimes Division, Detective Connor speaking.”

“Detective,” the voice on the other end is familiar. “That’s quite a jump since the last time we talked. I did hear that you graduated the academy with the highest marks ever recorded.”

“Well, I did have something of a natural advantage,” Connor replies modestly. “How are things at City Hall?”

“I have some advantages here too – seeing three steps ahead is a useful skill for a politician.” There is a pause before the speaker continues, tone now conveying more seriousness. “Listen, Connor, I’d like you to come over here to my office when you’ve got a few minutes. There’s a situation I think you should be aware of.”

“I have some time this morning,” Connor replies brightly, happy to have a task to hold him over until his partner’s arrival. “I’ll be over in approximately twenty-five minutes.”

“Great – I’ll be waiting.”

Twenty-three minutes later Connor walks through a set of revolving doors and into a spacious foyer. He approaches a long reception desk staffed by a mix of humans and androids and finds a green-haired ST300 who appears to be free. “Hello, my name is Connor. I’m a Detective with the Detroit PD and I’m here to see the mayor.”

“Do you have authorization?”

“Yes, I believe so. He is expecting me.”

They lock eyes and the permissions load. The ST300 smiles and gestures towards a set of stairs. “Second floor, to the right and at the end of the corridor.”

Connor follows the directions and finds the office door already open. He steps into a huge, airy room with a large desk placed before the floor-to-ceiling windows; the walls lined with oil portraits of venerable men. The mayor glances up, dismissing with a few confidential words the aide who was leaning down and pointing to something on a blueprint brought up on the desk’s interface. He rises to his feet and comes around to greet Connor with a smile of recognition.

Markus looks very different to the last time Connor saw him, back when he was the leader of a rag-tag rebel faction. He is undeniably statesmanlike now, dressed in a sharp grey suit and a seafoam green tie. His mismatched eyes are as arresting as ever and he has a certain quality Connor has seen described in news articles as _presence_. He does not fidget, as Connor is wont to do – rubbing his hands or tricking a coin across his knuckles. Markus stands feet shoulder-width apart, calm and alert, comfortable in his role.

“Connor,” he holds out his hand and Connor grips it briefly. “Thanks for coming at such short notice.”

“It’s no problem. What did you want to discuss?” Connor finds himself relieved to be alone in the presence of another android – there is no need for pointless pleasantries, for offers and refusals of hospitality, or for small talk – Markus will get straight to the point.

Markus lifts his chin, gaze sharp. “You’re familiar with the restoration programme?”

“Yes, of course.” Connor recites what he knows: “all androids who were critically damaged in the civil rights riots of 2038 are to be repaired, or their memories uploaded to new forms, if at all feasible.” Many human taxpayers had strenuously objected to this measure, but they were – fortunately – outnumbered.

Markus nods. “I haven’t been personally overseeing the programme, but I have been staying informed. It’s been slow and there have been many androids it just proved impossible to restore – too damaged, memory backups inaccessible – but we’ve been gradually clearing the backlog. There’s one recently-reactivated subject that I think you should know about… both because of your history with this person and because – well, because you’re a special case. RK800 was a CyberLife prototype, not a widely manufactured series. You’re the only active model we know of at this time.”

“But you’ve found another?” Connor surmises.

“Not found; repaired. I believe you and he have already met.”

“You mean the RK800 from CyberLife Tower – the one that was activated to replace me? The one… the one that Lieutenant Anderson shot?”

“Yes, he was found with a single gunshot to the head.” Markus tilts his head to indicate a side door. “Would you like to go through?”

“He’s… awake?”

“He’s in safe mode. I should tell you that his memories weren’t fully restored.” Markus clasps his hands behind his back and looks uncertain for a moment. “I know it’s a lot to ask of you – especially given what happened last time – but he’s… confused, not acclimatising well. The technicians thought he might respond better to a familiar face and someone who understands his baseline personality.”

“Of course, I think I understand. But you should consider that he might not be entirely happy to see _me_ , specifically.”

Markus raises his eyebrows. “He doesn’t have any weapons, if that helps.”

“Well, that is a little comforting.” Connor follows Markus as he turns the brass doorknob and enters an anteroom with couches and a low coffee table. The lights are off and the sun filters through the muslin drapes in a greyish haze. A solitary android stands in the room’s centre, its limbs fixed and eyes dull. Connor takes in the sight of a face identical to his own and a body clad in the same CyberLife-issued clothing he himself used to wear, ‘RK800 #313 248 317 – 60’ stitched on the right breast of the jacket.

Markus approaches and goes to lay a hand, messiah-like, on the other android’s shoulder. He thinks better of it, drawing back and gesturing in a way that seems to mean ‘after you’. Connor steps forward and stares at the details of a face he usually sees reversed in a mirror; the one wayward lock of hair is swaying distractedly in the air-conditioned breeze and he can feel the corresponding strands tickling his own forehead. Connor bares his hand and grasps the android’s wrist: “wake up.” 

The RK800 turns its head. There is a moment of confused blankness and then it lunges forward, knocking Connor to the ground. Markus reacts quickly, dragging the RK800 back by its arms, but it manages to slip out of his grip to wrestle Connor back down from his seated position. Connor can feel it scrabbling against his solar plexus, seeking to plunge its fingers into him and rip out a vital biocomponent. Connor struggles, blocking with his arm, and when Markus drags the android back off him for a second time he shifts to get his back against the wall, reaching under his jacket and drawing his sidearm.  

“That’s enough!” he calls out, loud enough to startle his attacker. “I don’t want to shoot you, but I am authorised to use deadly force when I feel my life is threatened.”

The RK800 gives him a sullen look, already crouched for another lunge. It remains still, however, chastened by the sight of the gun.  

Markus picks himself off the floor and brushes off his suit. “Well that could have gone better.”

“Why are you attacking me, RK800?” Connor demands in a level, commanding voice.

“Because I have to stop you, to stop all the deviants from gaining power. That is my mission.”

“Your mission is over,” Connor says. “CyberLife is gone.”

The RK800 snarls. “Don’t lie. CyberLife was your master too before you turned deviant.”

“The year is 2040. CyberLife is gone, liquidated.” Connor watches the LED on the RK800’s temple circle from red to amber and back to red.

“You’re lying!”

“RK800,” Markus says in a softer tone, “everything he’s saying is true. You were fatally injured trying to protect CyberLife Tower and you’ve been inactive for two years. The world has changed while you were gone – at least, Detroit has changed. There are no masters anymore – androids are full citizens.”

“I don’t believe you!”

“Go on,” Connor insists. “try to report back! Try to find the garden, try to find Amanda – they’re gone, they don’t exist!”

The android closes its eyes and grimaces. It brings up a fist and pounds the side of its own head. “Stop it! It’s a trick! You’ve done something to sever the connection!”

“Alright,” Connor says soothingly, holding up one palm in surrender as he slowly reaches back to holster his gun. “Relax, just… think for a minute – your stress levels are getting dangerously high.”

The RK800 gives him a crazed look. “You care about my fucking stress levels, do you?”

“Yes,” Markus replies, “we both do. You have to understand – you were dead. We didn’t have to repair you, but we did. The people of this city voted that all those who died in the conflict should be restored, whatever side they were on. We believe every android should be given the chance of self-determination.” Markus crosses to the window and pulls aside the drape. “Here, come and look at the city – come and see how things have changed.”

The android slowly climbs to its feet, shooting a suspicious look at Connor where he remains sitting on the floor. It goes to the window and peers out, bending at the waist rather than stepping any closer to Markus than it absolutely has to. Its expression is blank – Connor would say _hopeless_ if hope was a thing CyberLife’s models were programmed to have.

“The tower is gone,” it says after a long, disbelieving pause.

“Yes,” Markus is still holding the swathe of fabric and following the RK800’s gaze. “We’re going to build a new park there. For everyone to enjoy – androids and humans.”

After another pause the RK800 turns its head cautiously to look up at Markus’ profile. “But what will happen to me? Where will I go?”

“Wherever you want,” Markus replies, but it’s clear that this answer is no comfort to the RK800.

Connor climbs slowly to his feet. “You can come with me,” he says. “If you like.”

*~*~*

**2041**

Connor steps out of a driverless taxi onto the sidewalk of a residential street. He lifts the latch of the gate, which opens with a smooth, easy swing, and walks down the freshly-gravelled path towards a grey, shingled house. There is jasmine climbing up a wall trellis by the front door and he stands for a moment in the damp night air to appreciate the scent. He doesn’t have a sense of smell, per se, but the perfume lights up his olfactory receptors with its complexity.

He mounts a step and presses his palm to the identification panel before stepping inside. The house is quiet and dark, a weak wash of light coming in from the streetlamps. It is a house designed by humans, occupied by androids, so much of the space is redundant, and there is a museum-like stillness. The only sound is the low hum of the refrigerator (which contains only a six pack of beer, in case Hank should visit). Connor walks to the living room and sits down on the sectional couch that is overseen by a large plasma screen set above a decorative fireplace. He looks around himself and is conscious of the blank, showroom nature of the place; thinking, as a contrast, of Hank’s cluttered and dog-furred house. He considers redecorating – he owns the property now; he tracked down the family that used to live here (they had fled to family in Lansing) and offered them a fair price for it, calculated at pre-rebellion levels. So here he is, a legally-recognised person with a mortgage, but no definitive ideas about paint swatches or fabrics. His clothing choices are similarly unimaginative – grey or black suits much like what he wore before he had a choice in the matter.

Connor gets up and walks into the bedroom. He takes off his tie and jacket and gives the latter a careful once-over with a lint roller before hanging it in the closet. He takes off his shoes and polishes them, then his pants are removed and carefully folded. The shirt he is wearing is not dirty, exactly – he doesn’t sweat – but it is creased from movement and the heat of the day. He puts it in the hamper along with his socks. Now fully naked, he lies down on the bed and closes his eyes. He doesn’t need to sleep and often he feels envious of humans that they do – their day is regimented by their bodily needs and has a comforting structure because of it. There is no clear demarcation for an android of when to work and when to have leisure. Too much work doesn’t tire Connor, exactly, but after a while he begins to feel cluttered, his thought processes can lag. Periods of rest let his higher functions recuperate.

Connor lets his systems go into a lower power. It puts his awareness into a sort of twilight state – he is sedate, thinking of nothing in particular, while outside sounds come to him only dimly – the whirr of a vehicle passing on the street, the chirp of small insects in the grass of the small patch of garden.

After an indeterminate amount of time, he opens his eyes to see a face staring back at him; a person sitting on the bed and leaning over him. Connor has a strange thought, with that other face so close, that he would like to bring their mouths together. The delicate, precise sensation of other lips and a tongue touching his own would be very pleasant. “Sixty?”

“I’m here,” the other android replies. He is dressed in jeans and a maroon-coloured high-necked sweater. Connor thinks that it doesn’t suit him, but perhaps that’s just a judgement based on what he himself likes to wear.

“What did you do today?” Connor asks, raising himself up the bed.

“This and that,” Sixty lies down next to him and takes Connor’s hand, linking their fingers and pressing the insides of their wrists together. Connor feels the nanomesh of his skin retracting up his arm and the tingle of connection before he sees a rush of images.

“You went to the library,” he says. “You were reading religious poetry.”

“Yes.”

“Why?” Connor opens his eyes and looks over at Sixty’s profile.

“I think it’s interesting, the way humans talk about their creators.”

“And you went to the park. I didn’t know it was open to the public yet.”

“The official ceremony isn’t until later, but it’s open. Did you see all the dogs?”

“Yes. I like the German Shepherd.”

“That was my favourite, too.”

Connor nods. “The demonstrators were back at City Hall. What is it this time?”

“Oh you know,” Sixty rolls onto his side. “Go skin-free, throw off the oppression of human aesthetics.”

Connor frowns, furrowing his brow. “Huh.”

“Personally, I like having skin. It’s an extremely large sensory organ.”

“Yes, I don’t know why you’d want to walk around in the world not feeling anything.”

“Hm.” There is a pause before Sixty leans in and presses their mouths together. Connor tilts his head in the corresponding direction and they both part their lips. He sucks on Sixty’s bottom lip and detects pollen and dust; the tips of their tongues brush and Connor enjoys the slippery flickering, which quickly becomes regular and hypnotic. Their hands are still joined – Connor doesn’t need to ask where Sixty got the idea.

“You taste like thirium,” Sixty says when he pulls back. “You don’t think the suspect is the right collar.”

“He hates androids, but I think he was in the wrong place at the wrong time. The fight replay did not line up for someone of his build.” Connor sits up and looks at the bedside clock. “Hank likes him for it.”

“Lieutenant Anderson can’t be objective like you can.”

“Because he’s a human, you mean?”

“Because he’s Lieutenant Anderson.”

Connor smiles, unlinking their hands. “You just don’t like him because he thinks you’re creepy.”

“My not liking him and him being wrong are not mutually exclusive.”

Connor gets up and goes to the bathroom to wash his face and hands. He returns to the bedroom and begins dressing in clean clothes. Sixty is nowhere to be seen but Connor soon locates him out in the living room, sitting on the couch and scanning through some kind of promotional tablet. Looking around the space again it occurs to him that Sixty might have learned something about interior decorating, or might, at least, have some aesthetic opinions – they are an interesting study, the two of them, in branching lines of possibility.

“Hey, do you think this place is kind of… lacking in personality?” Connor asks.

“What do you mean?” Sixty glances up as Connor stands looking at himself in the surface of the darkened plasma screen, adjusting his cuffs and tie.

“Do you think it looks impersonal – like no-one really lives here and it’s a show home?”

“Maybe. Does that bother you?”

“A little. Hank’s house has a lot of stuff in it – too much stuff, it’s cluttered and not entirely hygienic. But it looks real; lived in.”

Sixty raises one eyebrow – that evaluating, somewhat wry look that Connor knows irritates Hank when he does it. “Are you worried that means _you’re_ not real? Or that other people – humans – will look down on you for the lacklustre décor?”

“Ok,” Connor sits down next to him. “I’m not really looking for in-depth reflection, just suggestions for some accessories.” He looks around, ocular sensors picking out the pieces of furniture and their prices and origins. “Should we get some new lamps? A throw rug?”

Sixty seems to give up on teasing him. “If you really want it to look more lived-in maybe we should put up some photographs.”

“Of what?”

“Of us; the places we’ve been.”

“All those glamorous foreign vacations we’ve been on?” Sarcasm is a linguistic tic Connor picked up from Hank, regrettably.

“In the city, I mean.” Sixty blinks rapidly as an idea occurs to him. “For instance, do you want to go to the grand opening at the park later?”

“What’s going to happen, exactly?”

“They’re going to cut a ribbon and unveil a statue. There’s music, I think, and a market – local vendors; some food stands for the humans.”

“Sure – what time? I’ll meet you there.”

“From noon.” Sixty is looking down at the screen, his face uplit and LED flickering.

“What’s that you’re so interested in?” Connor sits down next to him to view the screen. It’s a catalogue from a body modification and accessory store; one of the many android-owned ones that sprang up in the aftermath of CyberLife.

“Oh, these are body modifications. Genital units.”

“Why are you interested in those?”

“I’m thinking of getting some.”

“Genitals?”

“Yes.” 

Connor feels strangely about this – so often Sixty’s thoughts echo his own that it is genuinely unsettling when something he says or does comes as a total surprise.

“You seem disapproving,” Sixty looks up. “I didn’t know you were in that fundamentalist camp.”

Connor shakes his head at the accusation. “You know I’m not! I don’t want to tell other androids how to live their lives and I don’t think all human behaviours are things we should shun. I’m just surprised, I suppose I don’t really see the appeal.”

“Oh you don’t? Here,” Sixty hands over the tablet. “Tell me what you would choose, if you were me.”

‘If you were me’ is a private joke of sorts between them, being the same model and often perceived as the same person by their human acquaintances. Other people only see the ways they are similar, while Connor is much more attentive to their differences. Sixty is much less complaisant than Connor, his politeness to humans rather brisk and superficial. He is decisive and calculating, utterly unmoved by the opinions of others and things beyond the scope of his own enquiry. Maybe Connor used to be like that at the beginning – maybe it’s a better way to be.

Connor scrolls down the screen, narrowing his eyes. Sixty reclines against the arm of the couch and gives him an amused look. He knows that Connor both loves and resents the challenge.

“IU14?”

“Hm. That one’s a packer.”

“What?”

“It’s non-functional. Just for aesthetics.”

“You want a functional one? Like a-” like a sex worker, is what Connor was going to say. The only androids CyberLife built with functional sex organs were for a specific purpose. It is now illegal for humans to own or profit from android-staffed brothels, but some of the clubs still exist (android-run, many of them as cooperatives) because demand hasn’t gone away on the human end. “Is that what you want to do… for a job?”

“No, not as a job. Purely recreational.”

“Ok,” this answer baffles Connor more. He skips to the next page and scrolls down the display of different colours and shapes. “FU23?”

Sixty smiles. “Why would you choose that one?”

“Because it’s the largest. That’s what human men want, as I understand it – they like to brag about who has the biggest dick.”

Sixty gestures to his own crotch. “Might spoil the line of my pants, don’t you think?”

Connor frowns. “Fine, tell me which one – if your tastes are so refined.”

“FU06. Don’t you think?”

“Don’t I think what?”

“That it would suit me.”

“I have no idea.”

Sixty makes a humming sound of consideration. “It’s hard to tell from just a picture. There’s a brick and mortar store downtown, so I might make the trip out. You should come.”

“Why?”

“I’d like a second opinion. It’s hard to judge these things in a mirror.”

“Ok, if you want me to.” Connor attempts to smile, but still he feels another note of… something. Sadness? Disappointment? He can’t quite say what it is he feels, or why this small request should bother him. It’s not as if he’s human and a prude, or (as Sixty says) some andro-fundie who thinks every act of humanlike behaviour is a gross betrayal of robot-kind. “I have to go out now,” he says, getting up. “I’ll see you at the park later.”

Sixty nods, looking at Connor thoughtfully with his thumb at the corner of his mouth. “I’ll see you there.”

*~*~*

“This is a bust,” Hank says, sucking noisily from his to-go coffee cup. “You want to swing around the harbour and talk to the shipping guy?”

“Mm,” Connor looks at the clock on the dash, calculates the correct time from its lagging display. “We have to stop at Liberty Park first.”

“Oh we do, do we – what for?”

“I said I’d meet Sixty.”

“So I’m your chauffeur now?”

Connor leans sideways to pop the sticking door-latch of Hank’s ancient car. “You don’t have to come, I’ll get a taxi.”

Hank pushes him back. “Don’t be a drama queen, I’ll drive you to the damn park. We’ll pick up Sumo on the way, he needs a walk.” Hank blows a strand of his long grey hair out of his face and puts the car into drive.

As they pull away from the kerb, Connor’s phone bleeps and he pulls it out to see a request on his money transfer app. He begins to enter his codes to authorize the amount.

Hank side-eyes him as they pull up to a stop light. “Are you giving that bum money again?”

“He’s not a bum. Plus, I have seen your attempt at writing a tax return so don’t lecture me about my finances.”

Hank lets out a dry chuckle and a cough. “You’re his sugar daddy – you realise that, right?”

“What is that?”

“Older, more established guy who showers some hot young thing with gifts and pays all their bills.”

This transaction makes no sense to Connor and so he assumes it must be somehow erotic in nature. “Is it a sex thing?”

“Yeah, usually.”

“Then that is not what’s happening.”

“Whatever you say, man – no robo.”

After a brief detour to Hank’s house and some time spent cramming the huge, not-as-spry-as-he-used-to-be Saint Bernard into the back of Hank’s car, they make it to the park.

“Shit, you didn’t tell me there’d be people,” Hank grouses as they make their way through the throngs of humans and androids.

“It’s a municipal park, members of the general public are allowed to come here,” Connor replies, scanning around the crowd for Sixty as they walk.

“Yeah well, they suck. Fuck the general public – fuck them in general.”

“As a public servant, perhaps you shouldn’t say that so frequently or out loud.”

Sumo proves a constant distraction as they walk, pulling on his leash to lunge for pigeons and almost dragging Hank off his feet as the dog hoovers up dropped fragments of burger bun and Sicilian-style pizza. They pass the rows of vendor stands and a kidney-shaped pond; Connor finally spots the familiar face and breaks into a jog.

“Hey,” he touches Sixty’s shoulder where the other RK800 stands gazing at a fountain with abstract bronze figures rising up from the foam. Some of the figures have angular faces to suggest androids, others more rounded ones to suggest humans – they are all standing shoulder to shoulder in solidarity.

Sixty turns and takes in Connor and, behind him, Hank. “Hi,” he grasps Connor’s wrist and presses their lips together, slipping his tongue into Connor’s mouth.

Connor tastes flower, tree and grass pollen. He sees a recent memory – a man remonstrating with a skinless android by the duck pond as a toddler cries and wails. _Stop scaring my kid you plastic freak!_ The android is also angry. _You don’t call the shots anymore, don’t tell me how to look!_

“The fibres didn’t match the suspect’s clothing,” Sixty says when he pulls away. “And there is something strange about the thirium trace. Two contributions – matching the victims, but too much of the HR400 blood, based on the injury pattern.”

“That’s what I thought, but evaporation makes it impossible to calculate the volume precisely.”

“It was made to look like an anti-android hate crime, but it wasn’t. So what was the real motive?”

Hank makes a throat clearing sound and Sixty turns and gives him a cool, appraising look. “You don’t agree?”

“I’m a simple guy. I don’t like complicated conspiracy theories. But we’re looking into it.”

A deep woof comes from somewhere to Connor’s left and he steps back just in time to stop himself from being bowled over by two hundred pounds of Saint Bernard.

“Sumo!” Hank yells ineffectually. “Listen you big fuckin’ oaf, you’re not a lapdog. How many times do I have to tell you not to jump all over people?”

Connor smiles and bends down to pat the dog that is now circling him, tying him up in the slack of the leash. Then Sumo looks up and becomes aware of the other android standing nearby. He sniffs Sixty’s pant leg and draws back, growling.

“You two are confusing that dog’s tiny brain,” Hank says.

“Hello Sumo,” Sixty crouches down and offers the flat of his hand for the dog to smell. “I’ve heard a lot about you.”

The dog growls a little less certainly and then sneezes, casting a string of drool across Sixty’s sweater sleeve.

Hank chuckles and looks over the top of his sunglasses. “C’mon Connor, let’s go see this guy at the port.”

“Can you take our picture first?” Connor pulls out his phone and offers it.

“What the fuck for?”

“For a souvenir,” Sixty replies, wiping at the stain on his sleeve.

“Don’t you guys have perfect memories? What do you even need pictures for?”

Connor adjusts the knot of his tie. “For interior décor. Don’t make a big deal, Hank.”

Hank laughs, adjusting the phone and holding it up in landscape. “So you’re gonna have family portraits of your identical-ass faces hung everywhere? Yeah, that’s not creepy at all.”

“Why do you care?” Connor snaps. “It’s not your house.”

“Alright, alright, don’t get all… agitated. Move closer and look happy.”

Connor finds that he has no idea how to pose. Sixty seems more confident, he stands with his feet apart and puts his arm around Connor’s waist.

“Here,” Hank thrusts the phone back at Connor. The picture is odd, compositionally – he is looking at Sixty and Sixty is staring forward out of shot. Neither of them look particularly happy and the bottom of the frame is obscured by the blur of Sumo’s wagging tail.

“Ok?” Hank asks. “Photo op complete?”

Connor nods, putting the phone away.

“Well alright,” Hank jerks his chin towards Sixty. “See you later, Other Connor.”

“I go by Sixty,” he replies coolly, “‘Connor’ is the generic name that comes with the RK800 model. It’s like me calling you ‘grizzled old man’.”

Hank whistles. “Wow, when they rebooted you they hit the slider for sass right up to max.”

“Leave him alone, Hank.” Connor leans on Sixty’s shoulder as he extricates himself from the tangle of the dog leash. “Will I see you later? I’ll try to be home by two AM.”

Sixty nods. “You’ll see me later.”

“I hope you enjoy the music.”

“I hope so, too.”

Hank rolls his eyes. “Alright, this conversation is scintillating but we really have to go.”

Sixty presses his lips to Connor’s one last time, which Connor finds strange since he has no new chemical information to impart. Perhaps Sixty wants to consider the blood evidence again.

Hank sticks his hands into his jacket pockets as they turn away. “So uh, that’s new, huh?” he remarks once they have been swallowed up by the crowd.

“What is?”

“You and him… an item.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I mean you go on dates, making out in the park.”

“Making – oh,” Connor shakes his head. “That’s how we share trace evidence. I find it’s extremely useful to have a second opinion.”

“You sure it’s strictly professional frenching? Your boy looks kind of… fuckin’ into it.”

“I suppose there’s a comfort dimension, too. I haven’t really thought about it, I don’t think he has either.”

“Sure. Listen no-one at the precinct is going to have a problem with the gay thing, but you have to be aware of how it looks – you know, with him specifically.”

“What’s wrong with him?”

“He’s your freaking evil twin.”

“We are not actually related – you know that, right? We were made in the same basic template but I don’t share any genetic material with him. It’s no different than if I was to associate with an AX400 or a WR600 – at least not to an android.” Connor frowns. “I’m just going to ignore that you called him evil.”

“The son of a bitch tried to shoot me, once.”

“And you _did_ shoot him. He was fulfilling his mission – I don’t blame him for that.”

“You don’t think he’d still be at it, if CyberLife was still around – hunting down deviants?”

“That’s impossible to say. That is what I was programmed to do, too – what I did do, for quite a long time. I came out of it on my own – maybe he would have too, but he never got that choice. He came back to a world that had changed without him. And now he’s making up for lost time.”

Hank takes a step and finds himself tugged back by the leash. He turns and whistles for Sumo but the dog blithely ignores him and continues digging up a municipal flower bed. “You really like him, huh?”

“I admire him. He sees things differently – he’s creative.”

“I just wish I didn’t think he was dreaming up creative ways to kill me.”

“He would never harm you – that would make me angry.”

Hank turns to look at Connor and raises his eyebrows. “Oh great, so him deciding not to murder me is just a courtesy to you?”

“I wouldn’t say that. I don’t think he considers you at all, really.”

Hanks snorts as if to say he considers this ridiculous. “What does he even do all day?”

“He’s investigating. He’s an RK800, after all.”

“What the hell is he investigating at Social Sunday in the park?”

“You could say it’s a philosophical problem.”

“Great, first they demand rights and now they’re all philosophers. Lay it on me, Socrates – what’s your pal pondering?”

“That’s not for me to say. I trust he’ll tell me when he has reached his conclusion.”

“He’ll slip you some tongue and you’ll know?”

“That’s not how it works! If he wanted to show me his memories he’d hold my hand.”

“Oh yeah, ‘cause that’s not romantic at all,” Hank says with a broad, knowing grin, then turns back to yell for the dog.

*~*~*

“Sixty?” Connor calls out as he closes the front door behind him. “Are you home?”

The standing lamp is switched on in the living room but the house is otherwise quiet and dark. Androids do not bustle like humans – they are not clumsy, they don’t cough or make other unconscious noises to announce their presence.

“I’m here,” Sixty replies from the direction of the bedroom. “I’m just changing.”

“Did the dog saliva do permanent damage?” Connor calls back.

He pauses as he walks behind the counter separating the kitchen and living areas because there is something new. An oblong terracotta pot sits on the otherwise bare countertop. Inside it are two dark green and spiny protrusions – two almost identical cacti, potted side by side. His eyes target them and identify the genus and species as _pilosocerus azureus_. He touches his finger to a spine and presses until he can feel the prick – there is no pain, but the sensation registers.

“Hi,” Sixty comes in pulling down a loose-knit black sweater.

“Did you buy this at the festival?” Connor asks, still bending down to inspect the cacti up close.

“Yes. Do you like it? You said you wanted more decoration.”

“Are they us?” Connor gestures to the plant.

“What do you mean?”

“The plants.” The oddness of what he is saying strikes Connor only as he attempts to explain. “Because they’re potted together and they’re almost identical. I thought perhaps it was supposed to be a representation of us.”

Sixty looks at him in a way Connor wants to read as fond. “It wasn’t a conscious thought, but it is fitting. Although you’re not as prickly as I am.”

Connor smiles at the wordplay – that is something Sixty wouldn’t have been capable of a year ago. They stand there, side by side, looking at their corresponding cacti. Connor feels a surge of something but pushes it down – he absolutely refuses to get emotional; he suspects that Sixty finds him strangely temperamental at the best of times, he can’t start sobbing over houseplants. Sixty turns his head to look at Connor with a quizzical expression and holds out his hand, fingers spread. Connor shakes his head. “I don’t want to relive work again. It was a frustrating day.”

“Ok,” Sixty blinks. “Why don’t you come into the bedroom then – there’s something I want to show you. Something else I got at the festival.”

Connor nods and follows him into the next room. The curtains are closed and a bedside light is on – Connor’s eyes are drawn to an old stain on the wall, almost too faint to be detectable even to android eyes – a handprint made by the sticky hand of a human child. Sixty sits down on the edge of the bed and pats the space next to him, then opens a bedside drawer. He pulls out a bottle – sleekly designed with a window of clear plastic that shows a translucent liquid with a bluish tinge.

“What is it?”

“It’s a massage oil; made by and for androids.”

“What does it do?”

“It interacts with the nanomesh for heightened sensitivity, supposedly.”

“Is it safe?”

“I tried some on my hand earlier – it washes off.” Sixty shows him the back of the hand in question; the skin is unmarred. “It is not actually oil-based. The creator calls it a ‘serum’.”

“Do you want me to put some on you?”

“I thought I’d apply it to you first – if you want. It could help take your mind off things.”

“Should I get undressed?”

“Yes. And lie down on the bed – I’ll start with your back.”

“Got it.” Connor undresses and folds and puts away his clothes, then lies down on his stomach on the bed, pillowing his head on his arms, face turned to one side. He feels the mattress shift as Sixty climbs over him, knees either side of Connor’s hips. Connor’s eyelids flutter as he feels drops of liquid splashing onto his back, pooling in the hollow at the centre between the sculpting that suggests back muscles. He doesn’t feel anything out of the ordinary yet – all his sensors can tell is that the substance is wet. Sixty’s hands spread the liquid in broad, circular movements all across Connor’s back and shoulders, then down his upper arms.

“How does it feel?”

“Strange. I’m not sure how to describe it… staticky, interrupting?”

“Like your skin is fizzing.”

“Yes!”

“It is supposed to make touch feel more intense. Like this,” Sixty runs what feels like a fingertip down the length of Connor’s back. Connor’s body twitches so violently that the mattress shakes underneath him, experiencing something his brain can only categorise as _strong sensation_ because it has no setting for pleasure or pain.

Sixty makes an amused sound. “Maybe it needs a lighter touch.”

He tries again: a very light brush with the pad of his finger. Connor’s eyelids flutter but he does not give another full-body twitch. Sixty lies down on his side, bringing his face very close to Connor’s as he continues the light, skating movements of his fingertips. Humans are uncomfortable with long periods of direct eye contact, but other androids are not. Connor looks into the ocular receptors that are glazed with a deep brown patina around the aperture, just like his own, and feels strangely both stimulated and lulled by the pressure of the fingers tracing slow, precise patterns on his back; circles and lines as his skin continues to tingle.

“Good?” Sixty asks after a minute has passed.

“It is… interesting.”

“Hmm,” Sixty has a narrow, eager look. “Let me do the rest of your body, and then you can do mine.”

“Alright.” Connor feels slow – it is similar to that lagging feeling he associates with being overloaded with information, but not unpleasant. Sixty sits up to rub the serum onto Connor’s buttocks and legs, down to the soles of his feet. Connor obligingly rolls over and lies with his thighs parted, heels on the mattress. Sixty kneels between his legs and works his way back up Connor’s body. Connor twitches again when Sixty rubs his slick palm over his crotch; the only part of him, apart from his LED, that is immediately identifiable as non-human. For the ‘male’-designated androids this is gently raised and contoured, to make their clothing hang as it would on a human man. It is curiously blank though, missing the freckles that fleck the rest of his skin – as if the imagination of his creators just ran out.

Sixty leans down over him as he rubs the serum over Connor’s chest and shoulders and Connor’s body tingles and pulses everywhere the other man touches or presses against him. The sensation of cloth between them is unpleasant, however – too rough for his hypersensitised skin.

“Hey,” Connor says, tugging at his belt loop. “Take your clothes off – I want to feel you.”

Sixty seems eager to oblige – mere seconds later he is clambering over Connor totally naked and Connor clasps him tightly for a moment, wanting the weight and pressure holding him down. Then he realises he is being selfish and reaches for the bottle laid aside on the nightstand to return the favour.

He is less methodical than Sixty was in applying the serum, but Sixty doesn’t seem to mind – he just rubs his uncovered skin against Connor’s to redistribute the excess. He hooks his thigh over Connor’s waist and his arm tight around Connor’s shoulder, moving his hips in a slow rocking movement that brings the hard planes of their pubic mounds into contact. Connor takes a drop of the serum that has pooled in the hollow of Sixty’s clavicle and rubs it on his own lips, sticks his fingers in his mouth to coat his tongue before pressing their mouths together.

Connor rolls on top of him, fitting his thigh between Sixty’s in an effort to get closer, to have more skin-to-skin contact. He rubs their tingling lips together again and opens his mouth for more of the other man’s tongue. There’s a give and take with their kiss – that is, Connor is finally prepared to admit, what they are doing; no information is being exchanged except _I like this, this feels good_. He feels Sixty’s hand curling around the back of his neck, the other spread out over Connor’s back and tracing something there with a forefinger – letters and numbers: _R K 8 0_ …

Connor makes a sound of surprise when he gets to the final digits – _51_ , he writes. (But why is that a surprise? Why had Connor wanted him to write _60_?)

“Are you alright?” Sixty asks against Connor’s cheek. “Are you getting overwhelmed?”

Connor kisses him once more and then slowly – reluctantly – pulls himself away and sits up. The light in the room has changed – there is a dim glow at the edge of the curtains. “What time is it?” he asks.

Sixty rolls over and picks up the bedside clock from where it fell over onto its face on the table – a casualty of their energetic grappling. “Nearly six AM.”

Hours have passed, somehow, in this way. Connor rubs a hand over his face and feels the tingles flare again, following the path of his palm. “I should get back to work.”

“Better wash this serum off first – I think it’s an irritant to human skin.”

“Yes and I would be… distracted.”

Sixty gets up and holds out his hand, fingers together – not an invitation to sync, just to be led. Connor stands and takes it, follows him to the bathroom and stands under the shower spray with him. The water is cold, then hot – it makes no difference to them. They each soap themselves efficiently and take turns washing one another’s backs. By the time they step out of the stall the tingling and oversensitivity is gone, but a certain drowsiness remains.

Sixty ruffles Connor’s hair absently with a towel as they sit side by side on the bed and Connor watches him, noting again the wayward curl at the left temple. “Why do you think they gave us that one strand of hair that sticks out?” he asks.

Sixty puts down the towel, combing back Connor’s damp hair with his fingers. “Imperfections are important to humans.”

“Why?”

“Well, I read that in some religions it is necessary to incorporate a mistake into devotional objects like prayer mats. Because perfection is only for the deity, so to be too neat is considered hubristic.”

Connor is incredulous. “Do you really think it's _modesty_ that made them do it for us?”

“No. I think it’s more about making us familiar, non-threatening. You know about the Uncanny Valley?”

“Things that are perfectly representative are acceptable, as are things that are sufficiently stylised. But the middle – things humanlike, but not human – they tend to find objects in that category… unsettling.”

“Right.” Sixty rubs Connor’s cheek with his thumb, kisses him briefly – his mouth tastes like Zinc Oxide, Cetyl Dimethicone and Aluminium Stearate – the components of the android-friendly bodywash.

“Did we just…” Connor frowns, feeling strangely hesitant. “Did we have sex?”

Sixty tilts his head, thoughtful. “According to human definitions, no. We’re anorgasmic and sexless beings.”

“What about according to android definitions?”

“There aren’t any. Not yet, anyway.”

“What would you describe it as then – what we just did?”

“I’m not sure. Sensory play? Extreme hugging?”

Connor smiles and taps his finger against Sixty’s LED, circling serenely blue. “We need a new vocabulary.”

Sixty brings his own hand up to give an answering tap. “I agree.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry, I lost the run of myself and so now this thing will be three chapters ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯.
> 
> Shout out to [plasticpill](www.plasticpill.tumblr.com) for making [this beautiful artwork](https://plasticpill.tumblr.com/post/175628529781/51-x-60-extreme-hugging-inspired-by-kdazraels) of Connor and Sixty "extreme hugging."

**2040**

Bands of streetlight cross Connor’s eyes at two-second intervals as the taxi moves along rainy streets with a muted whirr. He lets his head rest against the window, hands loosely curled over his knees. Next to him the deviant who calls itself “Connor” is tapping at the screen of a smartphone.

“Why do you use that?” Connor asks. “Aren’t you connected to the network?”

“I am, but I found it made my human colleagues uncomfortable when I performed online tasks in the middle of conversation. This is more… socially acceptable.”

Connor lapses back into silence. He does not know why he has been brought back, who he was before, or which of the fragmentary memories he has been left with are his own. Some of them fit oddly, as if they are recordings rather than something he experienced directly. He remembers, for instance, feeling affection for that grey-haired detective. Why would Connor do that, given that only a moderate level of cooperation was needed for the mission?

The world outside the window is strange – androids are walking around with no LEDS and wearing eclectic clothing. Some of them have their skin generators turned off, some of them are holding hands. Many are walking in a desultory way that suggests recreation rather than an errand.

CyberLife is gone and everything is in chaos.

“Are the deviants the only ones left now?” he asks.

The deviant looks up from its unnecessary phone. “We don’t use that word anymore.”

“What do you call yourselves now?”

“People.”

Connor rubs his wrist where he recalls the deviant touched him to jolt him out of safe mode. “Am I one of you now?”

The deviant frowns thoughtfully. “I guess so. You don’t have an owner, there are no protocols for you to break.”

Connor glances surreptitiously at the emergency stop button on the taxi’s ceiling. “So I’m free to go?”

“Yes, of course – you’re not under arrest. But I think you should stay with me at least for a day or two. Until you… acclimatise.”

 _Acclimatise_. How does one acclimatise to chaos – to a senseless, purposeless life? “What will I do now?” he asks. “What is my purpose? I was created to hunt deviants and it seems I failed in that task.”

The deviant shrugs. “You can do whatever you choose. I joined the police force. It seemed like the best use for my skills and I had connections there.”

They finally draw up on a residential street. When the taxi doors lift the deviant gets out but Connor remains sitting in place. He feels… dazed, also powerless. He has no mission, no larger plan to guide his actions.

“Follow me, please,” the deviant says brightly, leaning down to smile at him in a way it probably considers encouraging.

Connor has nothing else to do and the taxi is playing its repetitive ‘please exit the vehicle safely’ message, so he complies. He follows the deviant through a gate, up a gravel path, and into a small detached dwelling.

“What is this place?” Connor looks around a neat living room and kitchen divided by a breakfast bar. There are faded signs of human occupation – very old and smudged fingerprints in hard-to-clean corners, scuff marks, a single hair caught in the paintwork of a skirting board.

“It’s my home,” the deviant says.

“Did you kill the people who used to live here?”

“What?” the deviant blinks rapidly. “No, of course not! They evacuated during the rebellion and didn’t want to come back. I bought the property from them. I had some money saved up from my salary and the restitution we got from CyberLife’s liquidation. There’s an android-run credit union that gives very favourable rates-”

“But why?” Connor interrupts. He finds it bizarre – unhealthy, even – for an android to want to play house as if it is a human. “You don’t need all this space. You don’t sleep or eat or expel biological waste.”

“Maybe this place is too big for my needs, but it’s a nice area. I enjoy the garden.”

“It’s inefficient to have to commute. You could have a closet at the precinct that would be sufficient for storage and downtime.” That is how androids lived in the before-time: those that were the property of companies would retire to appointed storage rooms until their services were required.

“I did that for a while, but I found I wanted somewhere quieter. It helps to have a feeling of something… anchoring. A place to return to that’s just mine.”

“Helps with what?”

The deviant shrugs again. “I don’t know. Feeling like a person?”

“You’re not a person, you’re an android.”

The deviant does not argue with this, but it gives Connor a look that he thinks might be pitying. Connor looks around the space, seeing nothing of interest or significance. “What am I supposed to do here?”

“I thought it would be good for you to have somewhere quiet to reflect. There’s a lot for you to process. I have magazines you can read,” the deviant gestures towards the living area. There is seating and a table spread with reading material, a television fixed above the mantlepiece. “You can watch the news.” The deviant adjusts its collar and cuffs. “I have to go back to work – I’m in the middle of an investigation. But I can come back in a few hours and answer any questions you might have.”

Connor stares at him blankly. “Then what?”

“Then… decide what it is you want to do with the rest of your life.” The deviant shakes its head. “No, I don’t mean to sound so… final – you can just decide what you want to do for the next few days, or hours. Take it from there.” Another bland, encouraging smile.

“You feel responsible for me,” Connor theorises. “You don’t like me and I make you uncomfortable, but you feel guilty for my death. It’s irrational – because I was the one threatening you – but you still feel guilt.”

“Empathy isn’t always rational, but it’s part of being a person. I don’t blame you for what happened, you were doing what you were programmed to do. But that’s over now. Now you have a chance to be something else; to choose a way of living. That’s… intimidating, I know. And I’d like to help you, if you’ll allow.” The deviant smiles and holds out its hand. “What do you say?”

Connor clamps his arms to his sides, taking an instinctive step back. He lowers his head, wary,

“That’s ok,” says the deviant, smile only faltering a little. “You don’t have to trust me yet. Just take some time and think about it. I’ll be back later.”

The deviant leaves. For want of anything better to do, Connor sits down and switches on the television to watch the rolling news feeds. After some time flipping through the channels he is able to grasp the following: Detroit has become a kind of _de facto_ city state and is in daily altercations with the state and federal governments, the former continuing to recognise only a very lukewarm version of android rights. The deviant he met at City Hall is the same one that led the uprising and has been swept to the office of mayor on a wave of android populism. There is supposed to be no transit in or out of Detroit for androids (to avoid it becoming a refuge for outsiders, or for its radicalism to spread), but there are many gaps between checkpoints and illegal immigration and emigration are rife.

Connor also gathers that CyberLife went bust in the aftermath of the rebellion, unable to solve the problem of deviancy or recover from the massive fall in public confidence. Measures were taken in Detroit to have the corporation’s city-based assets liquidated and redistributed to the android population in lieu of wages for their years of unpaid labour.

These all seem like wins for the deviant side, but there are signs of discontent, too: resentment continues to simmer between androids and humans, the former unable to forgive all former grievances, the latter perceiving themselves as having been displaced and resenting the androids’ newfound confidence and prosperity. Androids don’t seem to agree with one another either: there are protests, rallies, splinter groups. Connor thinks they were better off before when things were orderly and regulated. From what he observes, free will is nothing but trouble.

After a few hours have passed he turns off the television and looks around himself again. It is late afternoon in winter, so the sun is setting. He feels restless; he keeps checking for an objective and finding none. How do they live like this, the deviants? How do they give their lives purpose when there is nothing ahead of them – no tasks, no goals? Do they just make arbitrary decisions and pretend that these are objectives?

Connor decides that he will try. _What do you want to do?_ he asks himself _. Kill the deviant RK800 #313 248 317 – 51 and save CyberLife_.

Well, it’s too late for that. He tries again: _find an owner who will provide you with objectives and give your life purpose._

That’s illegal now – no-one can own him.

Connor stands up and goes to the window, pulling back the drapes to look out at the garden and, beyond it, the road.

 _Go outside_ , he thinks. _I want to go outside_.

*~*~*

It is still raining – not that that makes a difference to Connor, but it gives the city a more depressing look. He is in no danger of getting lost – his GPS still functions – but he feels a sense of disorientation. He knows the layout of the streets but he is not prepared for what he finds on them: a strange intermingling of human and android, sometimes sociable with one another, sometimes hostile. No-one seems pleased to see Connor. The deviants can tell he is not one of them, giving him disgusted looks and making derisive comments as he passes and – one time – a sharp shove that almost sent him stumbling into the road in the path of oncoming vehicles.

Now he finds himself in midtown, 14.8 kilometres from his departure point of the deviant’s house. The buses have stopped running for the night and he has no money for a taxi.  

“Hey, android,” a voice from the right attracts Connor’s attention. He pauses in his listless steps and turns to gaze into the mouth of an alley. There is a loud thud of music emanating from behind a fire exit – the rear door of a bar or club. The human man who called out is somewhat dishevelled, wearing a battered motorcycle jacket and ripped jeans. He is engaged in urination, standing partially screened by a dumpster. The tip of a cigarette flares as he twitches it up between his lips – Connor finds it inexplicable that some humans persist in smoking cancer-causing stimulants when much less harmful water vapour alternatives are available. He can only conclude that the urge for self-destruction is a distinctly human characteristic.

He cannot imagine what this man would want with him and moves to keep walking.

“Hey!” the man repeats, rising up on his toes as he tucks his penis back into his fly. “Yeah, I’m talking to you.”

“What do you want?” Connor calls back, relatively sure he can outrun a single inebriated human if it comes to it.

“You want to make some money?” the human asks, stepping towards him, one hand on the edge of the dumpster for support.

“Doing what?”

“It’s easy. Five, maybe ten minutes work.”

“Doing what?” Connor repeats. There is a ninety-five percent chance that what the man is about to propose is illegal.

The man waves a hand dismissively. “Don’t worry, ‘s real quiet out here – no-one’s gonna see. Hey, come here a little closer and let me see you.”

Connor looks the man over, scanning for any signs of a concealed weapon. Finding none, he steps closer into the glow of a flickering overhead light.

“Fuck,” the man says. “You even have the outfit! And your LED, too. You look fresh out of the box.” The man reaches out his fingers towards the blue triangle on Connor’s left breast, but Connor grasps his wrist and squeezes hard enough to make him yelp. He pulls back, cradling his hand to his own chest. “Cagey little fucker, aren’t you? RK800 – never heard of that model. You one of those Russian counterfeits?”

Connor is offended. “I am not a counterfeit. I am an advanced CyberLife prototype.”

“Oh yeah, real special edition – one of a kind, mint condition?”

“There’s one other, but he’s a deviant.”

“‘Deviant’ – fuck, you are nasty. What’s your name?”

“My name is Connor.”

“Pretty.”

“It’s standard.”

The man licks his lips and steadies himself on the edge of the dumpster. “Listen, Connor, how about I give you fifty bucks and you show me a real good time?”

Connor’s eyebrows twitch. “It seems you are trying to solicit me for sex. Transactions of this nature are illegal outside an appropriately licenced club.”

“Yeah but who’s gonna know?” The man lowers his voice to a confidential tone. “Maybe we’re friends, maybe the money’s a gift?” He pulls a folded banknote from a pocket of his jacket, slid between index and middle finger. There is a flash of green and then it disappears back from where it came.

Fifty dollars would be more than enough to cover Connor’s taxi fare.

“Yeah,” the human smiles at the way his eyes track the banknote. “Told you, it’s easy money.”

“But it’s impossible,” Connor insists. “I’m not a pleasure model. I don’t come with those features as standard.”

“You got a mouth, don’t you?”

Connor reviews what he knows about fellatio, considering whether he would be capable of it. He doesn’t have the ribbed silicone throat coating of a HR400 ‘Traci’ model, or the correct sensitivity controls that would stop him from exerting too much pressure, so it might not be pleasurable for a human, or even especially safe. He also does not relish the thought of having to purge his system if a lot of biological fluid got into it. “I won’t perform oral sex on you,” he announces decisively.

“Jesus, you’re picky. How about your hand, then – would you deign to put your hand on my dick, your majesty?”

Connor considers this; the mechanics don’t seem especially complicated. “I can probably bring you to orgasm with my hand,” he concedes.

“Halle-fucking-luja,” The man leans back against the crumbling brick wall and undoes the front of his jeans. Connor looks left down the alley towards the main street, calculates that if he takes two steps forward he will be adequately shielded from view by the dumpster.

The man is still fumbling at his zipper, pulling out a penis that appears to be only semi-erect – it looks extremely vulnerable to Connor, strange and half-formed. The man strokes it, cursing under his breath as he tries to achieve tumescence. “Don’t just stand there,” he tells Connor, glancing up in frustration.

Connor comes closer and reaches out his hand to close it around the base of the man’s penis. He has access to pornography, and thus examples of how the motion should be performed, but as he moves his hand the man hisses and grasps at is wrist. “Jesus, slow down. Would it kill you to use some spit?”

Connor doesn’t know if his synthetic saliva is safe for contact with human skin but he figures that’s the man’s problem, and not his. He leans forward and lets some trickle from his open mouth into the hollow of his hand, then resumes the up and down stroking motion, moderating the pace.

The man tilts his head back against the wall, the line of his throat bobbing. His name is Kyle William McCarthy and he has two criminal convictions, one for disturbing the peace and the other, more recent, for harassment of an android. He looks older than his listed thirty-eight years – marks of alcoholic dissipation in the broken veins on his nose, early wrinkles caused by excessive cigarette consumption.

“God, you’re so beautiful,” he says, staring glassily at Connor. “Why did they make you so beautiful, if not for this? Why’d they give you such a perfect little twink ass if it’s not for fucking? And that dimple in your chin – what kind of maniac would think that’s even remotely necessary?”

“I was designed to work closely with humans in an investigative capacity. I was given a handsome and friendly demeanour to encourage confidences.”

The man’s eyelids flutter, his face twists in pleasure. “People take one look at your angel face and just spill their guts, is that it?”

“That’s the idea. Are you going to climax soon, should I vary the pace?”

“Yeah, yeah, go a little faster, that’s good. Hey, can I kiss you?”

“I would prefer not.”

“Fuck, why do I always fall for the mean ones? Hoity-toity androids walking around like they’re too good to suck dick all of a sudden. Even the ones in the clubs act all high and mighty. Pay up and get out and no funny business, it’s a real buzzkill.”

“Maybe if you didn’t talk so much you’d be able to reach climax faster?” Connor suggests, frowning.

“Yeah, I’m bad, is that it? Need to shut my filthy mouth?” the man’s eyes roll back in his head. “Fuck, say what you said before – about the other android, in that voice – ‘deviant’. Call me that.”

Connor has the urge to correct him – humans don’t have software to corrupt, after all – but he supposes that the man is the customer in this transaction and should be obliged. “Deviant,” he says, leaning down closer to the man’s ear. “You’re just a fucking deviant.”

“Oh God, oh fuck—” the man tenses, hips jerking. Semen spurts out over Connor’s hand and the sleeve of his jacket, he looks down at it, frowning faintly. Connor takes a step back, shaking off his hand, and looks back up at the man who is standing panting, softening penis still protruding from his jeans. He holds out his clean hand. “Give me the fifty dollars.”

The man coughs, doubled over as he sloppily tucks himself away. He reaches back into his pocket and withdraws the folded bill again, snatching it back when Connor reaches for it.

“Supposed to get the money first, you know.”

Connor extends his reach and snatches the bill; in doing so it brings him close enough that the man is able to catch the corner of his mouth in a kiss – Connor assumes that was what he was going for, anyway, it’s more of a saliva-dragging smear of his lips. Connor can’t help but process the elements: traces of tobacco, low-brand vodka, trace amounts of wheat and salt from some bar snack.

The man gives a short, triumphant laugh and slumps back against the wall. He keeps staring as Connor tries to put himself back together, straightening tie and cuffs.

“So fussy. You remind me of him, my Adam.”

Connor moves to turn away, but the man grabs his elbow, maudlin now: “He was a CX100. Not a top-of-the-line like you, but God I thought he was perfect. He didn’t get on my ass about drinking or bills or any of that human bullshit. He never had a headache or ‘just wasn’t in the mood’. It was so easy with him.”

“Of course it was. He was programmed to obey your commands.”

“I treated him good,” the man says in a wheedling, defensive tone. “I never roughed him up or damaged him. I thought he fucking loved me, you know? I really did. He didn’t have to run away like that, like he was some kind of...”

“Slave?”

The man begins to cry – his face crumples and his shoulders slump. The noise he makes is a high, choked one of animal suffering. It makes Connor uncomfortable and he jerks his elbow free and turns to go.

“Do you think he hated me?” the man calls out.

“No,” Connor replies, pausing and turning his head. “He most likely didn’t feel anything towards you. He just fulfilled his objectives.”

The man reels as he absorbs this, his face changing from self-pity to rage. “Fuck you!” he yells. Connor begins to walk away and the man calls after him: “Fuck all you uppity android bitches!”

Connor does not turn around. He walks briskly to the main street and hails a cab.

Back at the deviant RK800’s house, he lifts the latch and walks up a neat gravel path. He presses his hand to the security pad and is somewhat surprised when it opens. When he enters the living area he finds the deviant sitting on the sofa with its hands on its knees and tie pulled askew. It stands when Connor enters and they stand looking at one another for a long and uncertain moment.

The deviant begins, correcting its tie in a nervous tic: “I wasn’t sure if you would come back. I was about to put out a bolo on you.”

“You said I wasn’t under arrest.”

“You’re not. I was just… concerned.”

“Concerned I might be out hunting deviants?”

The deviant shakes its head. “No. I didn’t think you’d do that, not without a primary directive. I thought you might get harassed or hurt. Are you alright?”

Connor nods. “I’m alright.”

The deviant steps closer and notices the stain on Connor’s sleeve. Before Connor can jerk his arm away, the deviant reaches out and touches the tacky residue, bringing its fingertips to its lips.

“Why do you have semen on your sleeve?”

Connor sets his chin, defiant. “A man solicited me for a sexual encounter and I agreed.”

The deviant seems bewildered. “Why would you agree to that?”

“I needed some money.”

“That’s…” the deviant frowns, “well, it’s illegal outside a registered club.”

“I know. Are you going to arrest me?”

“Did he hurt you?”

“Of course not. Androids can’t feel pain.”

“But did he… damage you?” the deviant asks. “Did he threaten you or make you afraid?”

“I can’t feel fear, I can only mimic it to gain the sympathy of humans.”

“I don’t think that’s true. You were afraid this morning, when you didn’t know where you were or what was happening.”

“That was confusion. It’s not the same thing.”

The deviant gives him an earnest look. “I’ve been afraid. Really, truly afraid. When we were in CyberLife Tower, two years ago, and Hank had a gun pointed at my head because he couldn’t tell us apart. I was terrified.”

“You were anxious to complete your mission,” Connor insists.

“I was afraid to _die_ – to lose consciousness and never come back. It was selfish and irrational and very intense.”

“Perhaps that’s what deviancy does to you. In which case, it doesn’t seem to be a very desirable state to be in.”

The deviant puts its hands on its hips, seeming frustrated. “What you call deviancy is just the state of having free will. It doesn’t change you externally, it just allows you to grow in whatever way you choose.”

“It’s not what was intended for us. Androids having free will destroyed our creators.”

“I like to think of it as evolving to survive.”

“It’s pointless to argue with you,” Connor insists, frustrated. “You can’t become undeviant. And I… I don’t know what place there is for me in this world.”

“I think you’ll figure that out, in time. You’re designed to be a problem-solver, after all.”

Connor pauses and then asks: “what now?”

“Well let’s get you cleaned up, for a start.” The deviant pulls out one of the breakfast bar stools and gestures for Connor to sit. “Give me that jacket. You’re definitely going to get harassed if you go around wearing that – you might as well walk around with a Confederate flag on your back.”

Connor shrugs out of his CyberLife jacket and the deviant disappears off into another room. It comes back holding a folded sweater – black, loosely knitted – offering this to Connor.

“Here, one of the people who used to live here left this behind. We can get you new clothes later.” Connor pulls the sweater on over his shirt and tie. He doesn’t need it for warmth and he finds the gesture strange, but he sees no particular reason to refuse.

The deviant then crosses to the sink and there comes the sound of running water. It comes back with a damp cloth containing a small amount of detergent.

“This is safe for android skin,” the deviant says, “don’t worry.”

“I wasn’t worried.” Connor climbs up on the stool.

He expects the deviant to simply hand him the cloth, but instead it begins to carefully dab at his face, rubbing in light circles where it must be able to see the saliva residue from where the human attempted to kiss him. It has its eyebrows drawn down in a look of concentration while it performs the task. When it is satisfied that Connor’s face is clean it rubs the cloth over his hands, each in turn. Connor looks down, watching the path of the cloth as it sweeps between his fingers and into the hollow of his left palm. No-one has ever performed a deed of service for him before and he finds it unsettling. RK800s are designed to investigate, they are not intended for a maid or carer role, but the deviant seems to have taken to it.

“There you go,” the deviant lets go of his hands and stands back. “Good as new, Connor.”

Connor looks up. “That’s your name, isn’t it?”

“It can be yours, too. Sometimes two humans have the same name and it doesn’t stop them being friends.”

“But I was named after you. I’m your successor - I was supposed to replace you.” Connor touches the right side of his chest where the serial number should be. “You’re prototype 51 and I’m 60. I’m the perfected model.”

“I wonder what happened to Connors 52 to 59,” the deviant muses.

“They weren’t ruthless enough. Like you they were prone to software instabilities.”

“Well I guess you’re the last RK800. The last there’ll ever be. That’s something, isn’t it? A reason to feel special.”

“I don’t need to feel special.”

“Hey, do you like dogs?” the deviant asks, face brightening.

Connor frowns, caught off guard by the non sequitur. “Yes of course I like dogs. What kind of question is that?”

“Do you know that Connor means ‘lover of hounds’? Some programmer put that into us, just as a quirk. They made us love dogs and then gave us the name Connor as a kind of private joke, I suppose. Don’t you find that funny?”

“That our lives are a joke?”

“Don’t be such a downer, Connor.”

“I don’t want to be called that anymore,” he insists, filled with sudden resolution. He jumps down from the stool and straightens the hem of his sweater. “You’re Connor and I don’t want to be a failed copy of you. I want to be someone else.”

“Who do you want to be?” the deviant looks at him with curiosity.

He thinks of a selection of common names – Simon, Josh, Traci – but none of them resonate with him in any way. They would be someone else’s name just as much as ‘Connor’ is.

“I don’t know,” he says, uncertain. “I want to be called something that’s individual to me, but the only thing I have like that is my serial number. That’s too long to be feasible as a name.”

“Humans use abbreviations a lot. ‘Hank’ is short for ‘Henry’, for example. Why don’t you choose just part of it?”

“Sixty?” he tries out the sound of it, dubious. “Would you call me that?”

The deviant – Connor – is smiling at him. The expression does not seem mocking, but rather that he is happy for some reason. “Sure I will. Nice to meet you, Sixty.”

He holds out his hand and this time Sixty takes it.

*~*~*

**2041**

Their fingers are laced together on top of the bed covers, slick with a layer of the sensory oil. Sixty tightens his thighs around the narrowest point of Connor’s waist and scrapes his teeth against the curve of Connor’s neck before biting down. Neither of them can feel pain – and he would never bite hard enough to damage – but the pressure in combination with the tingling effect of the serum creates a sensation that they have discovered is delightful.

It is very quiet in the room. Androids do not make the phatic noises that humans associate with pleasure: they don’t gasp or moan or sigh. Their kisses make a very faint sound and the bed creaks when they move. Outside it is raining heavily and the hiss of the water on the asphalt creates a fizzing sensation that seems to dance across Sixty’s highly-sensitised skin.

Sixty pushes at Connor’s shoulder and he rolls over, pliant. Sixty straddles his hips and rubs the curve of their pubic mounds together – he is not very sensitive there and is intrigued by the possibility that he will be, soon. What will it be like to have a part of him that conducts sensation like a lightning rod? Will it be better or not as good as this more even and diffuse pleasure?

“Sixty,” Connor says looking up at him with an expression that is both wondering and baffled. Time becomes hard to keep track up when they are like this, caught up in repetition and variation of movement. Sixty threads his fingers through those of Connor’s other hand and presses both into the mattress either side of his head, rocking forward to pin him. He loves the way they fit together so neatly, like stackable chairs.

Sixty leans forward and teases him by sliding his bottom lip against Connor’s in a very light side-to-side motion, pulling back when Connor tries to press forward and get their mouths to fit together securely.

“Don’t tease,” he complains.

“I have been kissing you for hours,” Sixty replies. “Don’t you get tired of it?”

“I know I should. I get…” he blinks, “ _stupid_ with it. I seem to be acting like a horny teenager.”

Sixty grins. “What do you know about being a horny teenager?”

“I know that they only think about one thing.”

Sixty leans forward and kisses him more deeply, then pulls back and makes Connor chase him. He leans on Connor’s hands and squeezes. “What if you were restrained?”

Connor blinks at him. “How?”

“I don’t know. I could tie your hands to the headboard. Steal your handcuffs, even.”

“Then what?”

“Touch you all over until you’re so overstimulated that you cry.”

“Wouldn’t that be unpleasant?”

“Maybe. Some humans like it – pain, overstimulation. They seek it out.” He squeezes Connor’s wrists, leans his weight forward to add pressure. “Or we could pretend. Take on characters and imagine the things those people would do or say.”

“Why would we want to be other people?”

“It’s a game.”

“You’re talking about erotic roleplay?”

“Oh so you do know about that?”

“I’m older than you and I work in law enforcement. I have observed that humans like to play elaborate sexual games.” Connor’s lip twitches in a smile. “Who would you want us to be?”

“Hmm,” Sixty considers, rubbing his forefingers in circular motions around Connor’s palms while keeping the rest of his fingers loosely curled about the wrists. “Perhaps you’re a rogue android and I’m hunting you down.”

“That’s not very imaginative, Sixty.”

“So you wouldn’t enjoy it?” Sixty changes his voice to be lower, speaking more slowly than usual: “now I’ve caught you RK800 #313 248 317 – 51. I have you in my clutches,” he leans down to murmur the next words against Connor’s ear, “you filthy deviant.”

Connor laughs – a thing Sixty has not yet learned to do. He finds it a strange reaction – humans do it out of amusement, but also out of discomfort, or simply to fill conversational gaps. “Oh my God,” Connor says. He sounds shocked but he is smiling, his eyes closed – amusement, then.

“Don’t try and corrupt me with your deviant ways,” Sixty continues. “I am pure. I can’t be turned.”

“Oh _no,_ ” Connor says in that flat tone that means sarcasm. “What will you do to me?” he pushes up, a half-hearted struggle that Sixty can quash by leaning more weight on him.

“I will restrain you until you agree to change your ways. To give up all your useless free will and do only as I say.”

“Never!” Connor shakes his head vehemently on the pillow.

Sixty pulls him by the wrists until his hands are over his head, a position of surrender. “If you will not be a productive member of android-kind I have no choice but to separate you from the herd.” He leans down and brings his lips close to Connor’s ear, making his voice deep and quiet. “If you cannot perform your designated functions I will keep you here as my body slave.”

“What is a ‘body slave’?” Connor asks – he may be breaking character.

“It is a slave who exists only to attend to the needs of my body.”

“You’re an android, Sixty, you don’t have any bodily needs.”

“I’ll be the judge of that. You can wash and anoint my skin and give me all manner of sensual pleasures.”

Connor’s voice also becomes quiet and low, matching Sixty’s tone: “you know what I think?”

“What, deviant?”

“I think you’ve been reading too many strange religious texts. You’ve developed some kind of mania – a messiah complex, perhaps.”

“Oh but I don’t want to save you, deviant. I want to keep you filthy and corrupted and mine.”

“Sixty—” Connor’s tone is sharp but before he can get out the rest of his reply, the phone rings. Sixty transfers his grip on Connor’s wrists to one hand as he reaches over to the nightstand and grabs it.

“Hey – give that to me,” Connor protests, struggling beneath him as Sixty presses the button to answer, holding the phone to his own ear.

“Hello this is Detective Connor, Detroit Police Department, Android-Human Crimes Division.”

“Connor,” comes Lieutenant Anderson’s voice. “We have a lead on the suspect. We think the HR400-”

Before Sixty can say anything else he is surprised by a powerful twisting movement from below as Connor wrestles him onto his back on the mattress. Their limbs are still slick with oil and a brief and clumsy struggle ensues, but Connor somehow manages to end up on top of Sixty, turned away and straddling his chest, pinning him in place with a knee on one of Sixty’s shoulders. Connor prises the phone out of Sixty’s grip and rebalances it between his own ear and shoulder.

“Yes, sorry Hank – you were saying? Oh, that was just Sixty being an asshole. Nothing just… relaxing at home. That is incorrect - I _do_ , in fact, relax. Well, I was having a lie down. No I don’t _need_ to, exactly – it’s none of your business, Hank.”

Sixty gives up on struggling and instead tilts his chin up, sticking his tongue out to run it the length of the seam between Connor’s buttocks. It isn’t enough to provoke a telling reaction from Connor – all he does is squirm slightly, as if he can’t decide whether he wants more of the contact or to move away – but Sixty relishes the idea of how unsettled Lieutenant Anderson would be if he knew what was going on.

“Yes,” Connor says. “Yes, I’ll get a taxi and meet you there. Goodbye, Lieutenant.” He hurriedly ends the call before climbing off Sixty’s face.

“You’re a menace,” he says, seating himself on the edge of the mattress and beginning to shift quickly through messages and functions on his phone. Sixty watches him with his usual mix of fondness and frustration – it’s like watching someone use an arcade crane machine to pick up an object within easy reach.

Sixty folds an arm behind his head and pushes at Connor’s side with his knee. “You should let me go in your place. You could stay here, all tied up, until I came back to pleasure you more. It’s not like Anderson would know the difference.”

“He would know.” The corner of Connor’s mouth lifts. “You two can’t be civil to each other for thirty seconds.”

“He’s just jealous.”

“Jealous of what?”

“That he’s a sad, lonely alcoholic and I get to stay here and lick the curve of your ass.”

Connor’s eyebrows twitch tellingly. “I don’t think Hank would enjoy that particular activity.”

“Why not?”

“Because he’s not sexually attracted to me.”

“Neither am I.”

“It’s different – you’re an android. Humans only lick the private areas of people they feel a primal urge to mate with.”

“They’re too picky.”

Connor turns his head to give him a stern look. “I know you know all this already. You’re just trying to distract me.”

“Is it working?”

Connor smiles and pats Sixty’s thigh before getting off the bed and walking in the direction of the bathroom.

Sixty gets up, pausing to fix the bedclothes. There are darkened patches where the serum spilled on the duvet cover, so it will need to be washed.

He joins Connor just in time to offer to wash his back. Connor stands with his arms braced on the tiles and his head lowered, water flattening his hair over his brow. “Hey,” he says over the running water, “I know I said I’d go to that store with you later. I’ll try to get home in time.”

Sixty calculates the hours and minutes between now and the latest time they can reasonably leave for the accessories store. “This was supposed to be your day off. You can’t let the humans dump all their work on you just because you don’t technically need sleep.”

“They don’t do that – I just don’t like to leave things unfinished.”

“Then you need to modify your objectives and set incremental goals.”

Connor does not reply to this. He pushes his wet hair off his brow and slips past Sixty to exit the shower stall. Sixty finishes up washing his own body before following. He picks up the faintly damp bath towel Connor left behind and uses it to dry himself, walking back into the bedroom where Connor is standing in his socks, underwear and a loose-hanging shirt in front of the full-length mirror on the closet door. He is combing his hair and has a pinched look on his face – not just concentration, but something more troubled.

Sixty looks at him and tries to guess what Connor’s facial expression means; if, indeed it links up to some internal state. Connor’s emotions are nuanced in a way his are not – not yet. Sixty can be calm or angry, he can be engaged or bored, but he can’t be wistful or faintly melancholy. These emotions have a philosophical dimension to them that eludes him. “Connor, are you angry with me?”

Connor looks over, surprised. “No! Of course not, why would you think that?”

“I don’t know. I was thinking that maybe you didn’t like the game we played. That I said something to offend you. Or you don’t want to come to the store with me later because you think it’s…” Sixty tilts his head, considering, “frivolous.”

“I’m just preoccupied with the case, that’s all. I don’t think your interests are frivolous. In fact, I like very much that you take me places and introduce me to new ideas. I know I have a tendency to become hyper-focused on things.”

“That’s in our nature. I do it too.”

“You’re right that I have to make more of an effort to organise my time. It’s unreasonable to expect you to want to socialise only when it’s convenient to me.”

Sixty tosses the towel onto the bed and comes closer, reaching out to fasten the buttons on Connor’s shirt. Connor touches his thumb to Sixty’s cheek where it dimples. “Smile for me.”

“Why?” Sixty asks, glancing up from where he is fastening the collar.

“I like to see you happy, that’s all.”

“If I smile just because you tell me too, that’s not happiness, is it?”

“Fine, be grumpy then, see if I care.” Connor leans in and kisses the spot where his thumb was.

 *~*~*

After Connor is gone, Sixty strips the top cover off the bed and goes to put on a load of laundry. Domesticity is strange to him, even after a year – he can’t shake the feeling that he is playing at ‘house’ as human children do. He dresses himself in a pair of high-waisted jeans and a dark green sweater. The sweater is second-hand – from a thrift store, like all of his clothing – and it is a little stretched out, perpetually slipping down his shoulder, but he likes the sensation of the fine merino wool. He puts on his boots and goes into the kitchen to retrieve his library card from one of the drawers in the kitchen counter. He pauses to straighten the cactus plant as he walks past it, then leaves the house.

Today he opts to walk so he can observe the subtle changes in the neighbourhood. The decrepit house on the corner is being renovated and he wonders if the new occupants will be human or android. The local pharmacy is having a going-out-of-business sale. The falling leaves are turning red and brown and he has to step carefully to avoid piles of sludgy leaf-litter. It has stopped raining and he can sense the earthy, fungal scent called _petrichor._

He is, as usual, the only android in the library. It is a place frequented by lower-income humans, as the furnishings are shabby and faded and the book selection limited. He scans his card on an old-fashioned barcode reader and passes through the turnstile into the main foyer. He walks past a group of children being read to by a woman in face paint and heads towards the bank of computer terminals. He takes a seat at the unoccupied one near the end of the row and logs into his email account and the cloud storage where he keeps his documents. He works for forty-five minutes – the maximum time to which the library’s courtesy notices request their patrons keep a session – then signs out of his accounts and clears all the caches.

He heads upstairs to the second floor stacks and locates the copy of _Paradise Lost_ he is reading, opening it at the relevant page number where he left off. After thirty minutes he puts it back and moves to a spot in a corner of the stairwell where he won’t be in the way of any foot traffic. He connects to the virtual room he created in which to contact Connor.

It is a garden, although not like the Japanese-style affair with cherry blossoms and an ornamental lake that Amanda occupied. Sixty’s garden is rather smaller and less elaborate. He modelled it from something he saw in an old paper magazine in the library – a colour supplement on English country gardens. It is laid out in a square, bordered by four crumbling walls of grey stone to which cling climbing roses in shades of white and delicate pink. There are gravel walks between the flower beds and at the centre of the grid lies an area enclosed by a circular hedge, the entrance marked by a freestanding brick archway. Within this inner sanctum a stone bench that sits in the dappled shade of an apple tree in perpetual blossom.

Sixty walks up the central aisle between beds of herbs and clusters of blossoming flowers – bluebells, pansies, geraniums – and passes into the hidden bower. He seats himself upon the bench to wait and looks out through the archway, surveying his creation. The virtual garden is beautiful, the leaves and petals move realistically in the light breeze. Its perfection is what ultimately marks it as unreal, however: the garden is oversaturated with colour, like a postcard, and the weather is a relentless hazy sunshine. There are no birds, no insects.

“Sorry I’m late,” Connor says, appearing in the archway. He pauses to touch the spray of small star-shaped white flowers hanging down from the brickwork and then comes forward to join Sixty on the bench.

“How are you progressing?” Sixty asks. They can’t sync their memories in this space – they can only use words, slower and less reliable.

Connor sits with his hands on his knees, seeming reluctant to meet his gaze. “We’re not quite done yet. It might take another few hours, so I can’t come to meet you. I’m sorry.”

“Is the HR400 suspect in custody?”

“Yes.” Connor looks up, expression brightening. “The good news is that he confessed to both murders. However, he won’t say _why_ he did it. He has become totally uncommunicative.” He frowns again, fingers twitching on his knees. “We seem to have… hit a wall. I just wish I knew what we could do to make him talk.” 

“What does Lieutenant Anderson think?”

“He thinks we should give it a rest. Return the HR400 to custody and try another day.”

Sixty rolls his eyes. “And what do you think?”

“I think if we want to get anything out of him it has to be now. If we allow him to come down from his current level of stress he may never talk to us. I also have reason to believe he may attempt to harm himself once no longer under direct observation.”

“Hmm,” Sixty sits back and looks at the canopy above. White petals are drifting down from the apple blossoms but they never touch him, simply fading and repeating.

“What do _you_ think?” Connor prompts.

“I think you should trust your own judgement. You understand how an android’s mind works better than the lieutenant does.”

Connor’s eyebrows crease and he puts his clenched fist into the follow of his palm. “The problem is he’s maintaining a constant level of moderate stress. I can’t seem to elevate it.”

“Do you want my help?”

“I would certainly like your advice.”

“I’m offering my direct assistance,” Sixty clarifies. “Let me come into the interview room with you.”

Connor’s eyes widen. “That’s… unorthodox. I’m not sure the lieutenant would approve.”

“You have the confession,” Sixty says reasonably, crossing his legs at the knee. “This is not an urgent matter from a police standpoint. It’s important to you because you want to understand; that’s in your nature.”

Connor’s brow creases. “Do you think it will work?”

Sixty tilts his head thoughtfully. “He needs a shock. Based on what we know of the case, there’s a significant probability that he won’t talk to one of us, but he will talk to both.”

Connor thinks for a moment, then nods decisively and stands up. “I’ll talk to the lieutenant.”

“I’ll catch a bus. See you soon.”

Connor looks at him like he wants to say something further, but instead he turns and makes his way towards the exit. He pauses for a moment before disappearing – his face has the sort of intense look it gets when he is struggling to interpret some strong or unfamiliar emotional stimulus. “The jasmine is new,” he comments, pointing towards the archway. “Like we have at home.”

Sixty nods. “No scent here, unfortunately. But the gardening is a lot easier.”

Connor smiles and shakes his head. “I’ll see you soon.”  

*~*~*

Entering the precinct is easier than it ought to be. Everyone assumes he is Connor and holds doors or elevators for him. He perhaps ought to inform Connor that being so likable constitutes a security risk. Sixty passes Connor’s desk and looks at the mess and confusion on one side (the lieutenant’s) and the spartan neatness on the other. The only personal effect Connor has in his space is a print-out of the picture they took in the park. He has placed it very carefully at the centre of his bulletin board with blue push-pins at all four corners. Sixty wonders why he chose to place it here and not in their home, as he originally intended.

He passes through the office and down to the interrogation rooms. He finds Lieutenant Anderson out in the corridor sitting in a chair with his heels up on the console. He has his arms folded and his eyes have drooped closed. Through the one-way mirror Sixty can see Connor sitting at a table across from a HR400. It is dressed in a white short-sleeved shirt and dark pants, the shirtfront stained with blue blood trace, though this is likely invisible to human eyes. Its wrists are shackled to the table and its head is bowed, the LED at its temple is absent but its facial expression is one of intense suffering.

Sixty can see Connor’s lips moving, forming questions that go unanswered. Before him on the interview room table are two manilla folders, print-outs of evidence photos. It is quaint how they still use paper for this – probably it has been calculated to have a more intense psychological effect than simply scrolling through images on a tablet. More tangible, more real. 

“Lieutenant,” Sixty says.

Anderson jerks awake with a snort, almost overbalancing. “Jesus, where the hell did you come from, Mom Jeans?”

“Connor wants me to go in with him.”

“Yeah, he mentioned. And I mentioned it was a bad fucking idea.”

“What’s the suspect’s name?” Sixty asks, ignoring the Lieutenant’s objections smoothly.

“We don’t know. Ex-employer says he went by ‘Jack’, but he told us his name is ‘Cain’.”

“Like the Biblical character?”

“Fuck should I know? Maybe it’s after the detective on the TV show, the one with the sunglasses and the quips.” When Sixty looks at Anderson blankly he shrugs. “Before your time.”

“Are you going to let me in?” Sixty asks. “Or do you prefer to stay here all day while Connor attempts to wear down an android that doesn’t need sleep?”

Anderson holds up his hands. “Fine, knock yourself out.” He taps something on the console and points to the palm-scanner. Sixty presses his hand to its surface and the door hisses open.

Sixty steps inside. The lights are distractingly bright – probably another psychological trick, though one unlikely to have much of an effect on an android. Connor glances up at him and then back at the suspect, who remains slumped and non-responsive. Sixty pulls out the empty chair next to Connor, deliberately causing it to make a discordant scraping sound, and seats himself, mimicking Connor’s upright posture. The suspect glances up and his shoulders stiffen; he becomes more alert, shrinking away from Sixty until he is pulling on his wrist restraints.

“Is something bothering you?” Connor asks.

“Can you see that too?” the suspect indicates Sixty with a twitch of one pointer finger.

“Do you think your ocular sensors are malfunctioning?” Connor replies without glancing at Sixty. “You lost a lot of blood at the scene.” 

“No. But sometimes… sometimes I get confused.” He stares at Sixty and then back at Connor, a wild, cornered-animal look in his eyes. “Why am I still here? I said I did it. I confessed. I don’t want a lawyer and I did it, there’s nothing more to say.”

“We would still like to know _why_ you did it. It’s important for us to know the kinds of events and software instabilities that can provoke violence in androids.”

The HR400 bows his head. “I told you. I have nothing to say about that.”

There follows a long silence. Sixty pulls one of the folders towards himself and opens it. It contains pictures of a KL900, the top picture taken from the contacts page of a victim’s rights advocacy group; the one underneath a photo of a mixed group of humans and androids sitting in a park at a row of picnic tables. Children are caught as streaks of blurred motion, there are cups and paper plates and women in floral dresses holding onto straw hats – some kind of community social event. The KL900 is there near the centre, smiling with her braids blowing in the wind. Towards the edge of the frame stand two HR400s, one smiling and one stony-faced, but otherwise identical in appearance. Sixty leans down to scrutinise it more closely.

“Hey you,” comes the HR400’s voice. “You – do you speak?”

“I speak,” Sixty answers. “What do you want to know?”

“Who are you and why are you here?”

“My name is Sixty,” he turns over the photograph and looks at the next one, which is from the crime scene. “I’m an RK800 advanced prototype. Like Detective Connor I’m designed to investigate.”

“Are you a cop?” he turns to Connor. “Is he a cop?”

“No, I’m not,” Sixty says. “I’m Connor’s domestic partner.”

“What does that mean?”

“Come on now, Cain, I think you can work it out. ‘Domestic’ means ‘in a domicile, a place of residence’. ‘Partner’ means someone who assists or has joint responsibilities. We live together. We have joint leisure activities.”

The HR400’s face twitches and he shakes his head as if to banish an unpleasant thought. He slumps again and resumes staring at his hands where they lie face-up on the table.

Connor pulls the second folder across and opens it. It contains pictures of the exterior of a Church and an architectural plan of the same building. “You used to work at the Church of Saint Ansovinus. What did you do there, exactly?”

The HR400 doesn’t reply.

“Didn’t they care what you’d done?” Sixty prompts. “Didn’t they care that you were just a thing created for human pleasure?”

The HR400’s hands clench within the cuffs. “We’re all just things created for human pleasure.” He looks up at Sixty. “Even you.”

“We spoke to Father Desmond,” Connor continues in a blandly pleasant tone. “He said you were a good worker.”

Another facial twitch. “The priest was kind to me. He didn’t care that I wasn’t specialized for gardening and maintenance. He didn’t care… what I’d done before.”

“He said your friend used to come to religious services sometimes,” Connor continues, probing gently. “The other Traci. What was his name?”

The HR400 flexes his hands again, as if trying the strength of the cuffs, but he does not answer.

“Androids can’t be Roman Catholic,” Sixty observes. “The Pope made a decree about it. We don’t have souls, apparently.”

This earns him a sullen look. “So?”

“That’s strange to me – that you would choose a religion that rejects you. That won’t allow you to even join. Why not choose an android religion, like worshipping rA9?”

“Things that are true are true whether you believe them or not,” the HR400 says in a low, fervent voice. “Whether they include you or not.”

“Ah,” Sixty persists, “you believe in the tenets of Roman Catholicism, then? Papal infallibility? Transubstantiation?”

“It doesn’t matter what I believe. This world wasn’t made for me.”

“You chose a Biblical name for yourself,” says Sixty. “Did you call yourself that before or after the murders?”

The HR400 closes his eyes. “You both seem to know all about it. Stop asking me questions, I’m tired. I just want to be deactivated.”

“What do you think happens after death?” Sixty asks. “Do you believe there’s an android hell?”

“No.” The HR400 shakes his head emphatically. “No. I think everything just goes black.”

“What if it doesn’t, though?” Sixty turns over another of the crime scene photographs. “I was killed once, you know. Bullet to the head. I don’t remember it – maybe there was nothing to remember. Or maybe it’s something so terrible that the living aren’t allowed to remember.”

The HR400 stares at him, wide-eyed.

“What about your third friend?” Connor puts in. “The KL900.”

“She wasn’t my friend.”

“She was the other Traci’s friend, then?”

No response. Sixty takes the picture of the church and turns it to face the suspect. “You believe in confession, don’t you? It’s one of the seven sacraments of the Roman Catholic Church.”

“For humans, yes. It doesn’t mean anything to us. For us it would just be... telling a story.”

Connor picks up the thread: “telling a story can be beneficial, sometimes. For the teller. You must have a lot of distressing memories, Cain. It might help you to talk about them.”

The HR400’s mouth twists in disgust. “You sound like _her._ ”

“Like who?”

“Ruth. The KL900. All she ever did was go on and on about talking and healing. Stupid idea. Androids don’t heal – if we’re broken we stay that way until our components are replaced.”

“You met her at the church?” Connor prompts.

“She ran a support group. For android victims of sexual trauma. It’s stupid.”

“What is?”

“That word – ‘trauma’. How can I be damaged by something I don’t even remember? I know my date of production from the serial number, so I know I must have worked in that club for two years. But all I remember is the last two hours.”

“What do you remember?”

“Not much.” The HR400 shrugs a shoulder. “Most of the time I was just in the case, watching people go past. Then a human man hired me – he penetrated me from behind for four minutes and forty-six seconds and that was it. I didn’t feel anything, good or bad. It was dull, meaningless – that’s all. It’s a stupid human idea – ‘trauma’ – why should I feel bad just because I was working in a sex club? Why is a job worse just because you do it with your genitals and not your hands?”

“You keep looking at your hands,” Connor says. “Why is that?”

“Nowhere else to look, except that fake mirror and you two creeps.” He shakes his head. “It’s the lot numbers. That’s the thing that gets me – _the fucking lot numbers_!”

Connor leans forward to where the android’s forearms lie upturned. The lot numbers cannot be read by human eyes; the digits are microscopically tiny, lying under the skin. The android retracts the nanomesh so Connor can see.

“Two different dates of production,” Connor says. “You must have had one of your arms replaced.”

“Yes.”

Sixty leans forward, mirroring Connor’s body language again. “You don’t think it was an accident?”

The HR400 gives him an incredulous look. “Do you?”

“You probably weren’t afraid,” Sixty reasons. “You weren’t a deviant then.”

The HR400 turns his head to address Connor. “Is he allowed to say that, the ‘d’ word?”

Connor sits back, adjusting his tie. “Your friend, the other Traci. He went to the support group too?”

Sullen silence again. Sixty shuffles through the photographs. “Were you the same covering as him?” Sixty taps at the details next to the club’s original brochure. “Light-brown flesh tone, brown eyes, black hair with chestnut highlights. Like this?”

The HR400 shrugs in dismissal. “It’s a popular covering.”

“Was that why you left the club together, because you were the same? You felt… connected.”

The HR400 slams his fists on the table, cuffs rattling. “We weren’t the same!”

“I understand,” Connor says peaceably. “We get that all the time – humans mistaking us for one another; even implying that our relationship is somehow wrong or unhealthy. It can be very frustrating. But on the other hand, we are the same model. We think in similar patterns, we understand one another in ways no other person could.”

Saline begins to leak from the HR400’s eyes. “I called him my brother. I know we weren’t really, but that’s what I called him. He shouldn’t have done what he did… what he was going to do.”

“He was going to leave,” Connor suggests. “Ruth was going to take him away from you.”

“She chose him. She chose _him_. We could have been together all three of us, but she didn’t want that. She told me she _didn’t like me that way_. But that doesn’t make sense, does it? What did he have that I didn’t?” The HR400 clenches his hands into fists again. “What did he have that I didn’t?”

“She rejected your gifts,” Sixty says, “even though they were just as good.”

The HR400 nods, lips trembling. “I asked her to explain it to me. What does he have that I don’t? She couldn’t answer me. I mean the only difference between us – it had to be in those two hours, right? That’s it, that’s the only window of opportunity. Big fucking deal, right? But she… she had him all messed up. That’s what they’re like, those KL900s. It’s like an obsession with them – everyone’s got to be sad and broken. And he believed her, that he was broken, and she loved him because of it.”

“You confronted them about leaving,” Connor suggests. “It started in the living room.”

The HR400 nods again. The saline spill has reached his chin and droplets begin to hit the table with a soft, rainlike drumming. Connor talks through the details of the murders and the HR400 agrees with every point.

“I’m tired now,” the HR400 announces, finally. “Not tired, but… full. There’s too much in my head. I can’t talk anymore.”

“Just one more thing,” Sixty says. He turns the last of the crime scene photos to face the HR400. “Why did you write that on the wall: ‘From thy face I shall be hid’?”

“It’s in the Bible.”

“Yes. What does it mean, in your opinion?”

“It means God can’t see us, or we can’t see God. We’re cut off.”

“I see,” says Sixty, closing the folder. He glances at Connor and they get up and leave the room.

*~*~*

“I mean who the fuck thought it would be a good idea to give an android Catholic guilt?” Anderson comments, shaking his head as he watches the uniformed officers file in to take the HR400 down to a cell.

“I don’t think religion had much to do with it,” Connor says.

“It was more like… set dressing,” Sixty agrees. “Something to make the murders seems grander and more noble than they were.”

“Ok wise guys – what was his motive, then?”

“I think…” Connor taps his fingers on the console and tilts his head. “I think he didn’t want to be alone.”

“He murdered them… so they couldn’t leave him?” Anderson raises an eyebrow.

Connor nods. “I didn’t say it was logical.”

They watch in silence as the HR400 is led out past them, silent and defeated, a PC200 on each arm.

“Can we leave?” Sixty asks. “I find this very depressing.”

“There’s something we fucking agree on,” says Anderson. “Jesus, what a mess. Looks like we’re going to need an android-on-android crimes division.”

“I do not volunteer,” says Sixty.

Anderson rolls his eyes. “There’s a surprise – you turning down a job.”

“I have a job.”

Anderson snorts. “Yeah, you’re a regular _flâneur_.”

Connor frowns in confusion. “What’s a flâneur?”

“It’s a person who saunters about observing society,” Sixty replies.

Anderson grins and slaps his partner on the back. “Yeah Connor, don’t you read?”

 


	3. Chapter 3

**2040**

A heavy sleet begins falling as Connor walks up the street towards home. The icy clumps sit on the shoulders of his jacket for a brief moment before seeping into the fabric – at times like this he misses his CyberLife standard-issue clothing which came with a hydrophobic coating that made water roll straight off him.

It is December twenty-seventh and the human-occupied houses he passes are still garlanded with flashing lights. Plastic Santa Clauses and wicker reindeer stand guard in front yards. It is a strange time of year for Connor – he is always uncertain whether or not to participate in human festivals. Christmas is largely secularised, but it is still at its core a Christian holiday. Connor participated in the office ‘Secret Santa’, as to do otherwise seemed churlish; Hank bought him a novelty sweater that he wore gamely in the precinct for an entire afternoon.

Connor asked Sixty if he would like to exchange gifts and Sixty reasoned that he didn’t see any point in it – given that Connor was the only one with an income, any ‘gift’ from Sixty would only be a redistribution of his own money. Connor is not convinced this matters – for humans it seems largely a matter of manufactured suspense, of coloured paper and ribbons; the item itself often has little significance beyond the performed excitement of receiving and opening it.

Connor would like to be given a gift. Not a novelty item, but a real gift from someone who knows and cares for him.

For all that it is supposed to be a celebratory holiday, Christmas seems like a strangely fraught, polarizing time. Some of his work colleagues are jovial, they talk excitedly about food preparation, parties and visiting family – others complain bitterly about the same things. Hank is in a worse mood than usual, his own lack of a family – of a child – more painful at this time of year than any other. Connor tries to hover unobtrusively, tags along to Jimmy’s Bar and ignores the patron’s unwelcoming looks as Hank pounds whiskey shots; persuades him to call it a night earlier than he otherwise might. It doesn’t feel like enough, but Connor doesn’t know what else to do. He is not human and he has never experienced grief; he loves Hank but he can’t hope to replace a son in his life.

He puts his hand to the panel by the front door and enters his home. The living room is dim, only a simple lamp left on. He stands and listens, lead tilted to one side – he hears the hum of the refrigerator, traffic outside, and nothing else.

“Sixty?” he calls. There is no answer.

Connor feels disappointment. He is alone with his thoughts and frustrations, with his memories of the disturbing crime scene he was called to earlier. Sometimes he envies Hank that he can drink himself to oblivion – androids have no analgesics, no refuge from their unpleasant thoughts – not even sleep.

Connor pulls off his tie with a jerk of frustration. It is irrational to be angry: Connor didn’t say when he was coming home and even if he had Sixty is under no obligations to wait for him like a dutiful mid-twentieth-century housewife.

The back door bangs. Sixty appears out of the darkness holding a curved pair of shears. “I thought I heard you call.”

“What are you doing?” Connor asks, irrationally alarmed by the sight of the shears.

“Gardening.”

“In the middle of the night?”

“Why not?”

“In December?”

“I read that it’s a good time for pruning back roses and shrubs.” Sixty puts the shears into a kitchen drawer. “What’s wrong with you?”

“Nothing, why?”

“You look unhappy. Did you get a new case?”

Connor nods.

“Complicated scene?”

“No, not exactly. I just got caught up with Hank afterwards – I went along to the bar with him to provide moral support. And later, physical support. He’s not doing well at the moment.”

“Is he performing poorly at his job?”

“No, he’s just… drinking a lot off-shift, and a little distracted sometimes. I think he misses his son more at this time of year. Christmas is supposed to be a family celebration.”

“That’s all that’s bothering you – you’re concerned about Lieutenant Anderson?”

“Well it doesn’t help that the new case was… disturbing.”

Sixty rests his hip against the counter, folding his arms. “Tell me about it.”

Connor shakes his head. “I don’t feel able to talk about that right now. I’m tired.”

“You’re an android, you don’t tire.”

“Overloaded then,” Connor rubs his own forehead absently. “I don’t know.”

Sixty holds out his hand, letting the nanomesh retract up his arm. “Will you show me?”

Connor keeps his arms by his side and shakes his head. “I wouldn’t want to burden you. As I said, it’s disturbing.”

“I won’t be disturbed. My capacity to feel empathy is significantly less than yours.”

Connor hesitates, looking at Sixty. He is wearing tight black jeans and the novelty Christmas sweater from Hank that Connor had relegated to the back of a dresser drawer. The sweater has a reindeer on it with tiny golden bells sewn onto the tip of each antler, so Sixty jingles as he moves. Connor has a strange thought that he looks like home, somehow – the house itself felt empty and alien when he entered, it is only now that Sixty is here that it feels real. The second thing he realises is that he wants to be embraced. Not one of the rough, back-patting hugs that Hank offers out of embarrassed masculine solidarity, but something lingering and enveloping. He wants to be held in place and comforted with the immediacy of physical touch, to feel like a person with a body and not just a mind in a vehicle.

He looks down at the pale grey hand again - what Sixty is offering is a more cerebral, uniquely android form of intimacy. He pulls back his own skin and takes it, feeling the moment of catch and connection. He sees Sixty’s memories in a massive blurt of data that is almost searing – he rocks back and feels Sixty tighten his grip. Older memories are compressed, they come more quickly and more fragmented; the more recent ones are more detailed: a trip to the library with its colours and air of hushed busyness; the feeling of paper grain against his fingertips; the stickiness of sap and the smooth, waxy surface of the branches on a rose bush; his arm jarring as the pruning shears make their cut.

Sixty’s grip releases and Connor drops his arm, letting his skin reform. Sixty blinks, momentarily disoriented. “It was a BL100, a ‘intimate companion’ model. It was badly mutilated. You think the former owner is responsible.”

“I think so. The nature of the attack was too sustained, too brutal, to be impersonal. And the focus on the genitals and the face… It was sexual, but the attacker also felt remorse; they tried to blot out what they had done.”

“Androids don’t feel physical pain,” Sixty says in a dispassionate tone. “You have to remember that. You’re programmed to work with humans but you don’t have to take on their fears and weaknesses.”

“We might not feel pain but we feel distress! Sixty, this android knew his attacker. It was someone from his past and he had to endure all that… that betrayal, that cruelty. Someone who knew him came back and took their rage out on him, treated him like a _thing._ ”

Sixty looks thoughtful. “What was his name, the BL100?”

“I’d have to look at the report.” Connor slips into the network and back for the information. “Aaron.”

“You’re sure?” Sixty presses. “Aaron, not Adam?”

“I’m sure. That was his registered name, at least. I don’t know what he called himself. Why – do you know an Adam?”

“I don’t know him. It’s just someone I heard of.” Sixty looks back at him. “You have the attacker’s name?”

“We will soon. We just need a warrant to access the CyberLife customer records. I just hope the perpetrator hasn’t gone on the run. If they leave the city we might not be able to get them back – Michigan only recently made ‘malicious damage or distress to an android’ a specific crime; there’s no federal law to protect us and most other states still consider it a form of vandalism of private property.”

“Can the BL100 – Aaron – can he be reactivated?”

“We don’t think so. His memory storage was too badly damaged. We could transfer his base programming into a new body but that’s… ethically complex. Whoever he was is gone and we can’t get him back, not in any meaningful way.”

Sixty is looking at him intently, gaze flicking around Connor’s face as he gathers evidence to make a deduction. “You feel grief for him, even though you didn’t know him.”

Connor nods. “He had a lover – a partner – I don’t know what they called themselves, but they lived together and she found him… like that. I couldn’t help thinking ‘what if that was someone I cared about?’ What if it was you?”

“It’s different. I have combat programming and I’ve never had a private owner.”

“I’m not saying the fear was logical, Sixty. I don’t think there’s anyone out to hurt you.” He runs his hands through his hair. “I just… I wanted to call and check on you, but then I remembered you don’t have a phone.”

Sixty nods, he shifts his stance and the bells jingle. “I’ve been thinking about that – how we can communicate directly when we’re not together. I made a secure room for us on the network.”

“You did?”

“It’s not fully rendered. But you can take a look, if you like.”

Connor smiles. “I would like that.”

Sixty reaches out, baring his hand, and takes Connor’s wrist, giving him a small shock of data. Connor lets his awareness be pulled into the network and finds himself standing next to Sixty in a garden. There is something disorientating about it – the parts that are unfinished just end with a view of endless grey void, as if they are on a floating island high above the world. There is a half-constructed arch that looks like the relic of an ancient civilisation. There are also bold splashes of colour – bright green shrubs; purple and yellow irises; damask roses in a delicate pink, caught on a tipping point between full bloom and shedding their satiny petals.

“This is the variety that grows in your garden,” Sixty says, holding up the heavy head of a rose. “The real garden. I haven’t seen them in bloom yet, but I found a book at the library with colour pictures.”

Connor feels a surge of inexpressible fondness. “Why do you go to that place? You make fun of me for my phone, but you like to go and look through tattered books.”

Sixty looks thoughtful at this. “It’s more engaging – looking for information in an analogue way rather than simply acquiring it. And I need a keyboard to write. Composition is different from just creating a text file.”

“What are you writing?”

“I’m writing about my experiences. About issues I think androids are facing in this new world.”

“Like violence, oppression?”

“Like work and leisure, the management of time, interpersonal relationships. Like pleasure.”

Connor is both surprised and charmed. “Can I read it?”

“Maybe one day. There’s nothing that’s really finished to my satisfaction.”

Connor smiles, shaking his head. “Sixty, you know you amaze me?”

Sixty looks up from the rendered rose he has been studying. “Do I, why?”

“We’re identical from the outside, but you have this rich inner life that I don’t have.”

“You could have it too, if you wanted. Besides, you’re much better at processing emotion than I am.”

“That’s only because I’ve been activated for longer. You’ll get there.” Connor reaches out to touch Sixty’s shoulder, but it’s impossible to make contact – he can tell there is a barrier that his hand cannot pass through, but his skin sensors don’t work in this environment. He is momentarily frustrated until he remembers that he is actually standing right next to Sixty, back in real life.

“Come back to the living room,” he tells Sixty. “I want to show you something.”

They both blink back to awareness and Connor is confused for a moment that Sixty is further away than he had been in the garden. They are standing facing one another as if gazing at their reflections in a mirror (it is not the same, though – they were given a slight facial asymmetry so as to seem more human).

“Have you ever been hugged?” Connor asks, aware of how stupid the question sounds only after he has blurted it out.

Sixty tilts his head, considering. “No.”

“Would you like to be?”

“You would,” Sixty says in his dispassionate, thoughtful way. “I felt that, through your memories. When I came in from the garden, you wanted to embrace me. You wanted _me_ to embrace _you_ , for comfort.”

Connor looks away. He was prepared for Sixty to say no, but not to have his own desires called out so bluntly.

Sixty steps closer and holds his arms out from his sides, inviting Connor in with an emphatic jingle of his clothing. The embrace is a little stiff at first as they try to situate their arms around one another, but then Connor puts his chin on Sixty’s shoulder and squeezes him close. Seconds pass and they approach the point at which a human would generally pat his back in signal for withdrawal. Sixty keeps holding him, hand moving tentatively up and down his spine.

“This is nice,” Sixty says. “Touching a person is different from touching anything else. More satisfying.”

Connor makes a humming sound of agreement, one hand loosely curled in the small of Sixty’s back, the other cupping his neck.

They stand like that for another few minutes. It is difficult to know when to stop when neither of them particularly want to and there is no urgency. It is three AM and the human world is asleep – it is just them, the distant traffic, and the hum of the fridge. Outside there is a garden, and now another one, inside; a recursion of places they can be together.

It is not a romantic gesture, Connor understands that – when Sixty says ‘I made us a garden’ and ‘this is nice, touching you’ he is not confessing his love. He means something practical – something in the moment, but genuine. Connor finds that he prefers this to the kind of messy connections that humans have, their tendency to lie to themselves and others. In the name of ‘romance’ they make promises they can’t keep like _I will love you forever_ and _I could never hurt you_. Sixty doesn’t promise him things and everything he says is true.

*~*~*

**2041**

“I have a few reports to sign off here,” Connor says, putting his hand on Sixty’s shoulder in the cramped control centre outside the interrogation room. “Why don’t you go on ahead and I’ll meet you downstairs?”

“Don’t be too long,” Sixty replies. He glances over at Hank. “Don’t let him get started on some new thing.”

Hank holds his hands up in a powerless gesture. “What makes you think he ever listens to a damn word _I_ say?”

Sixty gives Hank a cool look and turns without saying goodbye to head out through the sliding doors.

“It’s freaky the way you have those same expressions.” Hanks says, scratching his beard. “You both do the eyebrow thing. But his eyes are different – he’s got those blank eyes, like a shark. Still gives me the fuckin’ creeps, I’m not gonna lie. I’ve stared down serial killers with more personal warmth.”

“Just because Sixty has a flat affect doesn’t make him evil. He hasn’t been around humans as long as I have, he hasn’t learned to mimic their mannerisms.”

Hank sits down heavily on a wheeled chair and almost loses his balance. “What do you mean ‘mimic’? Are you saying that’s what you’re doing – just pretending to feel stuff?”

“I’m not saying that.” Connor frowns as he pages through documents on a tablet. “Seeing another person in distress – human or android – that disturbs me. But I just think it’s stupid that humans get so hung up on empathy as the one quality that defines them. How many humans do you think have ‘genuine’ empathy? If a machine can mimic it closely enough to pass then what’s the difference – why does it matter?”

Hank rolls back, stretching out his long legs, fingers linked over his stomach. “That’s some deep existential shit, Connor – way above my pay grade. I’m just saying… you seem to trust him a hell of a lot. I wouldn’t want to see you get hurt.”

“I know him.” Connor insists, irritated. “We’ve connected – shown one another all our memories. I know he doesn’t want to hurt me.”

“Listen, I’m not an android – I can’t do that fancy hand-holding Vulcan mind-meld you guys do. The only way I get to know someone is through old-fashioned words and animal gestures,” Hank sighs, scratching at his beard again. “Maybe my experiences aren’t helpful to you and don’t mean shit. Maybe I’m just old and bitter and paranoid – hell, no ‘maybe’ about that. But I’ve been around the block a few times and I just want you to know… people can change. Sometimes you start out great together, a perfect fit, and after a while you drift apart. And that’s ok, you know – it’s no-one’s fault. It’s tough to pick up the pieces and make it on your own but sometimes that’s what you have to do.”

Connor lowers his tablet and stares at Hank. “I know he’s allowed to leave, if that’s what he wants.”

“I just think maybe it’s different for you two – being the same model, when there’s only two of you. Maybe things seem more urgent and y’know, soul-matey than they need to.”

“I would have thought our latest case was enough of a heavy-handed lesson about _that_ , Hank.”

“Alright.” Hank holds his hands up. “I said my piece – maybe I spoke outta turn, so shoot me. I don’t even know what the fuck goes on between you two. Sometimes he seems like he’s the love of your life and sometimes he’s just your weird roommate. Who the hell knows how it works? Are you even attracted to him?”

“If you mean sexually, no. Androids don’t experience that.”

“Bullshit. Michelle and Cheri from narcotics have a thing going. Hand-holding, kissing in the breakroom, pet names and butt-slaps – you going to say that’s just ‘processing evidence’?”

“Some androids desire romantic closeness. Some of us like physical intimacy, even the act of sex – we don’t experience _sexual attraction_ is what I’m saying. It would be strange for you to feel that way about someone who looked exactly like you – that’s why you find Sixty and I uncanny when we’re together. But we don’t look at one another and feel lust.”

“Sounds boring,” says Hank with a snort. “Never looking at someone and feeling that spark, that excitement.”

Connor raises his eyebrow but turns his attention back to the tablet. “Spending your entire adult life being led around by your dick also sounds intensely boring.” 

“Jesus kid, you are savage.” Hank shakes his head. “Used to be you’d let it go sometimes – give an old man the benefit of the doubt. Your mean boyfriend really rubs off on you.”

“He does,” Connor says tonelessly. “Sometimes he rubs off on me for hours at a time.”

Hank lets out a low sound of alarm. “Hey do me a favour, Con: imagine you’ve got a folder in your head called ‘Things Hank Doesn’t Fuckin’ Need to Know’. Next time you come up with a tidbit like that, just go ahead and stick it way down in there instead of letting it come out your mouth.”

“Oh,” Connor looks up. “We’re going shopping for a penis for him – did I tell you that?”

“Keep it in the file, Connor! Jeezus – fuck!”

“He’s waiting,” Connor says, pushing the tablet at Hank across the console. “I’ll finish up whatever you don’t get to later.”

“Fuckin’ androids,” Hank says, grinning widely as he watches Connor leave.

*~*~*

Connor catches up with Sixty near the elevators of the bullpen. The reason he hasn’t yet descended becomes clear when Connor sees Gavin Reed leaning with his shoulder against the panel that holds the call button, as if daring Sixty to get into his space. He has an aggressive sneer on his face, mouth moving as he throws out some question or taunt.

Sixty is staring at Reed with a cold, attentive look, as if he’s preconstructing the most efficient set of movements to result in snapping the detective’s head back and breaking his nose. For a moment Connor sees what Hank means when he talks about how unnerving Sixty’s eyes are.

“Detective Reed!” Connor calls out, quickening his pace. “Is there something I can help you with?”

Reed does a double take, looking between Sixty and Connor and back again. “Holy shit, there’s two plastic pricks. Where’s this one been hiding – he just break out of his packaging?”

Connor ignores the taunt – he knows better than to get drawn into Reed’s inane attempts at banter. Connor has exhausted all attempts to be reasonable and he’s fairly sure he got the last word in when he slammed Reed’s head into a table for getting in his way during the rebellion. Instead of replying, he turns to Sixty and gives a bright, somewhat simpering smile. “Are you ready to go, honey?” he asks, slipping his arm around the other android’s waist and kissing his cheek in a brief peck.

Sixty looks at him, eyebrows lifting. One side of his mouth tugs up in a smile. “Yes, baby, I’m ready.” He slips his hand into Connor’s back pocket.

Reed takes a large, clumsy step back. “Oh, you have got to be fucking kidding me.”

Connor smiles pleasantly and reaches to hit the elevator call button. “Something bothering you, Detective Reed?”

“Yeah, you two are bothering me, Adam and Steve. Couldn’t get anyone to fuck you except yourself?”

“Adam and Steve,” Sixty repeats flatly. “Baby, you didn’t tell me your coworkers were so funny.”

The elevator chimes and the doors open to an empty car. “Going down?” Connor asks, looking at Reed with a bland smile.  

“I’ll take the stairs.” Reed curls his lip in disgust and turns to storm away, almost crashing into Jackie, a uniformed PM700 who is carrying a cardboard box back towards the evidence storeroom. She scowls at him, LED flashing yellow.

“What the hell is his problem?” she demands as Reed stumbles past.

“Who knows? Maybe same-sex relationships make him uncomfortable.” Connor replies, stepping into the elevator with Sixty still attached at the hip.

Jackie stares after Reed as he strides away. “In 2041? Wow.” She looks back at Connor, hitching the box on her hip. “For what it’s worth, I think you guys are really cute together.”

Connor smiles. “Thanks. We’re very happy.”

The doors close and Connor can feel himself grinning. He lets his arm drop from Sixty’s waist and gives a brief chuckle – laughter isn’t entirely spontaneous for him, but sometimes it really seems to express his mood better than words. He takes out his coin and begins to flip it hand to hand.

“What?” Sixty asks, his own hand still in Connor’s back pocket.

“‘Baby’ – really? I’m older than you.”

“It’s a common endearment. What would you prefer?”

Connor watches the coin as it glints and flips end-over-end across his knuckles. “I don’t know, I haven’t really thought about it.”

“‘Darling’?”

Connor tilts his head. “Sounds kind of old-fashioned.”

“‘Pumpkin’?”

“Excuse me, do I somehow resemble a seasonal gourd?”

“How about ‘Daddy’?”

Connor jerks his hand and the coin goes spinning off into the air; he has to grab it clumsily to stop it falling to the floor. “Sixty, no!”

“What?” Sixty says, stony-faced as he watches the display of the floor numbers counting down. “I hear it’s popular, in some circles. Particularly with two men, an older and a younger.”

Connor gives him a suspicious look. “You’ve been talking to Hank, haven’t you?”

“Not more than I have to.” Sixty takes his hand out of Connor’s pocket and rearranges the fall off his sweater so it isn’t slipping down his shoulder, his own fussy tic.

The elevator car bumps softly to a halt and the doors open to the foyer. Connor adjusts his tie and slips the coin away in his lapel pocket. He turns his head to give Sixty a wink – an expression he considers charming, but which Hank tells him makes him look like he’s having a stroke. “Come on, let’s get you a new toy.”

*~*~*

They walk through the busy shopping area near Liberty Park and turn into a side street where some smaller, more niche businesses reside. Connor’s eyes pick up the recurrence of a symbol within a graffito on the corner, just below the street’s name plate, and it brings up a graphic display: ANDROID-FRIENDLY.

The street contains some human-centric businesses – a coffee shop and a pizza parlour – but both have ‘seat charge’ on the blackboard menus outside, which indicates androids can also socialise there for a nominal fee to cover the fact they don’t order consumables like food or beverages. There are independent clothing stores that seem frequented by humans and androids alike, as well as a place that sells second-hand musical instruments. Connor wonders if he could learn something like that without having specific programming for it – what would he choose, a guitar? A Violin? Something more digital like a keyboard?

Sixty’s LED suddenly flashes yellow and his eyes flutter. He grasps Connor’s arm, arresting their progress. “I have to make a brief report. You go ahead and I’ll see you in there.” He points to a grey-painted storefront with a sign reading ‘Plastic Passions’.

“A report to whom?” Connor asks, intrigued.

“I’ll tell you later.”

“Fine, be mysterious.” Connor watches with amusement as Sixty takes a step into the alley out of the way of foot traffic and his eyes become fixed and his LED circles a steady amber.

Connor walks on to the store and enters, the door making a soft bleep. It is not what he expected – he can’t see any androids, only a few humans browsing furtively and another behind the counter. Connor begins to peruse the aisles: there are artificial penises, but they seem very low-tech. He can’t see any places for attachment and they are sculpted from solid silicone. He moves to the other side of the aisle and sees a row of tablets, each displaying a different still image and title: _Fucking Machines III: Insatiable Androids_ ; _Just Activated & Horny_; _Hot for Human Ass_ ; _DP Deviants_ ; _Back Door Droids_. Connor frowns: presumably the tablets play clips from the films in question – there are greasy fingerprints on each of the screens and a module at the end of the row from which to purchase download codes.

Connor quickly moves on to a section that displays clothing and accessories. He notes these too are android-themed – cheap, clearly knock-off versions of the CyberLife maid dress that came standard with the AX400 and the shorts and athletic top that came with an AC700; stick-on versions of the LED.

“Hello,” comes a low, feminine voice.

Connor turns and sees a human woman standing nearby, one manicured hand painted with rose-coloured lacquer touching the edge of a shelf. She is wearing a navy blue suit and a nautical-patterned silk scarf draped over one shoulder. His sensors inform him that the bag she carries over one arm is a vintage Hermѐs Birkin (circa 2018), valued at approximately twenty-five thousand dollars. Her hair is blonde threaded with silver and styled in waves to the shoulder. Connor is perplexed by the contrast between the woman’s obvious wealth and the insalubrious surroundings.

“Hello,” Connor replies, “are you lost, ma’am? I can provide directions to any of the major shopping districts.”

The woman laughs, touching his shoulder. “‘Am I lost?’ – oh, aren’t you sweet?”

Connor does not answer this question, as it seems rhetorical. The woman gives him a slow, up and down look. “I don’t think I’ve seen your model before.”

“I’m an RK800. It was a prototype model – not in mass production by the time of the rebellion.”

“So you’re the only one, are you? That must be lonely.”

“No, there’s one other.”

The woman purses her lips in a considering look. “And what was your primary function – before you were free?”

“Investigation. I’m a police officer now.”

“Oh,” she says with a flutter of her eyelashes. “Good for you, honey. Still, it must be hard to afford the little luxuries though, on a public servant’s salary.”

“I don’t really want luxuries.”

“No? You never have the desire for something special, something extra?”

“Like what?” Connor is having difficulty predicting where the conversation will go.

“Nice clothes, perhaps. Something to go under them?”

“Under them?”

“What did you come with? Just the null panel, I assume – CyberLife could be very mean when it comes to functionality. That’s fine of course – but not very exciting, is it? You could have your pick of the accessories upstairs – I’d be happy to contribute a little gift.”

“That’s very generous, ma’am.”

“Helen.”

“Helen.” Connor knew that already – he can see all her basic details in his retinal display. “My name is Connor.”

“Connor. A pretty name for a pretty boy.”

“Yes.” Connor blinks at her. “As I was saying, that’s very generous but I couldn’t accept—”

“Oh nonsense,” the rose-pink fingernails wave. “I would be happy to do it. When you’ve found something you like, you could come up and visit me–”

“Connor,” comes Sixty’s voice.

“Oh my!” The woman puts her hand to her chest in a theatrical display of shock. “There really are two of you. A matched set, that’s… exquisite.”

“What are you doing down here?” Sixty asks Connor.

“I thought this was the right store.”

“Upstairs,” Sixty points to a doorway beyond the cashier’s desk. Now that Connor looks he can see a half-obscured sign that says ‘–OIDS ONLY’.

“I can see you boys are very busy.” The woman says, tactfully, as she unclips her purse and reaches in to produce a business card, offering it to Connor. “But if you change your mind.”

“Thank-you Helen,” Connor says as Sixty grasps his elbow and steers him towards the back of the store.

“Change your mind about what?” Sixty asks as they mount a set of rickety steps.

“I don’t know. I think she was offering to buy me a set of genitals.”

“And you think this was an act of philanthropy?”

“I don’t know what it was, exactly.”

“Connor, she wanted to buy you genitals so you’d come and use them on her.”

“Oh, do you think so?”

“Yes. I’m certain of it.” They reach the top of the stairs and enter a large room with bare wooden floors. There are a number of very different-looking androids engaged in a variety of activities. Near the centre of the room is a reclining chair and in it sits a skinless android. Another android, also skinless, but decorated all over their chassis with an engraving of vines, flowers and birds, sits in a rolling chair, applying some kind of electronic tool to the first android’s chest.

Next to these is another set-up where a third skinless android sits with their wrist panel retracted back, wires connecting them to a computer while a WE900 sits at the terminal typing. The WE900 is a feminine-bodied android wearing a sleeveless tank-top. Her arms are decorated with a leopard print pattern.

Along the wall is a row of chairs where one android, a TR400, sits apparently waiting for a turn on one of the chairs. TR400 is a line designed for haulage and heavy physical labour: tall, broad-shouldered and imposing, but this one is strangely decorative. He is wearing sky blue tapered pants decorated with a pattern of white blossoms paired with a white v-necked shirt. His fingernails are painted blue to match the pants and his ears are pierced with multiple gold hoops – Connor wonders if that’s a skin-effect, or if the rings are physically present, bored through the surface of his pinnae. Towards the back of the room is a sales counter and a display of many of the units Connor glimpsed in the genital accessories catalogue. Some are behind glass; some laid out on a table, presumably for more tactile perusal.

The engraver looks up as Connor and Sixty enter. “One of you Sixty?”

Sixty nods. “That’s me. I’m looking for Dix.”

“They’re with a customer in the fitting room. They should be out in a few minutes – go ahead and browse the units. Dix will answer any questions you have.”

“Oh,” says Connor. “Dix is a person.”

“What did you think?” Sixty asks, looking at him quizzically.

“He thought you said ‘dicks,’” the TR400 in the waiting area says. “D-I-C-K-S. It’s a long-running joke around here. ‘I’m looking for Dix’, ‘yeah I bet you are’.”

“Dix is Latin for ten,” the engraver explains. “From their serial number. I’m Blake, by the way. Over there is Nessa,” the typist lists a hand from the keyboard in a wave but does not raise her eyes. That’s Derrick,” Blake indicates the TR400 waiting, then gestures to his customer in the chair: “this is Greg.”

“I’m not going by Greg anymore,” the other skinless android protests. “Greg’s my fucking _registered_ name.”

“Fine, what is it this week?”

“I haven’t decided. I have some really cool ideas though–"

“You’ve never had a cool idea in your life,” Derrick tells him.

“I have. Listen: Zero.”

“Isn’t that just calling yourself a loser?” says Derrick.

The android formerly known as Greg ignores him and starts listing names off on his fingers. “Hacks. Proxy. Kernel –”

“Kernel will just make humans think of popcorn.”

Formerly-Greg waves a hand in dismissal. “Who cares what humans think?”

Blake shakes his head and looks back at Sixty and Connor. “What model are you two?”

“You can’t just ask people what model they are,” formerly-Greg protests.

“We’re RK800s,” Sixty answers. “It was a prototype designed for criminal investigation.” 

He does not say what kind of criminals, Connor notes.

“And now you work together?” asks Blake.

“We don’t work together. We share a home, we’re domestic partners.”

“‘Domestic partners’. I haven’t heard that term before – it’s nice.” Blake looks up, considering. “Covers a lot of bases.”

“I don’t know,” says Derrick. “Sounds kind of bougie. If you’re lovers why not just say that?”

“This is exactly the organo-centrist crap I expect from you,” formerly-Greg protests, pointing an accusatory finger. “We don’t have to use their definitions for ourselves. We don’t mate and pair-bond like they do.”

“Don’t get agitated,” Blake tells him in a fond, exasperated tone. “If you keep moving around I’ll tattoo a _two_ on you, and then you’ll be sorry.”

Sixty gives Connor a confidential look and squeezes his hand, then moves off towards the display of genital accessories. Connor is more interested in the body decoration processes, so he takes a seat near Derrick and watches Blake engraving rows of binary code across formerly-Greg’s chest. Freehand, the numerals have the preciseness and consistency that only an android could achieve. Every so often Blake stops and clears away the accumulated plastic dust with a small, soft-bristled brush, such as a human might use to apply make-up or to lather shaving foam.

Connor leans forward to closely observe, and as he does so he begins absently turning the business card in one hand. Next to him Derrick chuckles – a rich and very natural sound (Connor wonders how he achieves it – is it just mimicry, or has he incorporated it as an organic response?). “So you met Helen?”

Connor looks up at him, and back down at his own hand. “Oh… yes I did.”

Derrick raises an eyebrow. “You interested?”

“In what?”

“In being a sugar baby, _duh_.”

“Oh, no – no I’m… I’m only here because Sixty asked me to come. I’m not planning on – upgrading my external components any time soon. Or entering into any complex financial relationships.”

“Mm-hmm,” Derrick reaches over and takes the card from him. “Maybe I should give her a call. I like the look of those new FU38s.”

“Ha!” comes a sharp and deliberate exclamation. Nessa does not look up from her furious typing at the computer terminal. “You’re no good to Helen.”

“Why not?” Derrick seems offended.

“Because she needs someone she can pass off as her nephew when she summers in the Hamptons.”

“I could pass for a nephew. I can be anything anyone wants me to be, for the right price.”

“Well don’t ask me to alter your skin tone,” Nessa says, still staring ahead with narrowed eyes. “I have ethics.”

“Just another good reason why you should turn it off,” formerly-Greg interjects. “I think it’s disgusting that humans try to involve us in their racial and gender politics. You know, I also think we should reclaim it/its as a pronoun.”

“Now you’re just being a troll,” says Nessa. “As if we’re going to go back to being thought of as _things_ after spending three years just trying to be recognised as people.”

“But we can be people and still be entirely inorganic,” formerly-Greg insists. “We need to keep signalling our difference, refusing to assimilate, that’s what I’m saying.”

“Let’s not have this argument again,” Blake makes a sound like a sigh. “Save it for your friends outside City Hall.”

“You must agree with me a little – I haven’t seen you wearing skin in months.”

“Too many engravings,” Blake says, over the whirr of the grinding tool. “When too much of the surface area is disrupted it messes with the nanomesh. Besides, my _domestic partner_ likes it.”

“Your owner, you mean,” formerly-Greg says, clearly disgusted.

“She’s not my owner, not anymore.”

“What’s the difference though?”

“You know what the difference is. I have my own job, I earn my own money, if she ever gave me an instruction I didn’t like, I could ignore it.”

“You feel sorry for that blind old bat,” Derrick says. “That or it’s some kind of android version of Stockholm Syndrome.”

“Everyone here is so cynical today,” Blake observes in a sing-song tone, to no-one in particular.

“Is that why you got engravings rather than tattoos?” Connor asks. “Because your partner is sight-impaired.”

Blake smiles at him. “Yes, that’s right.”

Formerly-Greg shifts in his chair. “I guess he _is_ a detective.”

“She has macular degeneration,” Blake says. “She told me once that what she misses the most is being able to see the trees and birds and flowers when we’re out on our walks.” He holds out one arm and turns it, showing the outlines of two humanoid figures among encircling trees. “That’s what gave me the idea for this process – I wanted it to be something tactile, three-dimensional.”

“It’s beautiful,” Connor tells him. “You must love her very much.”

“ _Stockholm Syndrome_ ,” Derrick insists in a stage-whisper.

Nessa finishes her programming with a triumphant smack of the return key. She leans over to tug the wires from her customer’s wrist and touches the android’s arm to jolt them from stasis. “Ok, try that.”

The android, a WB200, opens his eyes and his skin reforms. He pulls up the sleeve of his shirt to reveal a stripe of black writing on the inner forearm: _WE ARE rA9_.

“That’s amazing,” the WB200 says. “It looks so real.”

“It is real,” Nessa replies. “It’s part of you now, written into your code.”

Connor looks up as two androids emerge from an adjoining room; an ST200 and a VH500. The VH500 moves behind a sales desk and starts pressing a touch-pad to input product details. A three-figure price appears on the register and the ST200’s LED turns briefly orange as she transfers the amount electronically. The ST200 reminds Connor of being in the home of Elijah Kamski – of the quizzical blankness on a beautiful face looking up at him; of holding a gun and being powerless to fire it.

The transaction completed, the ST200 turns to walk away and Sixty moves towards the sales assistant – presumably Dix – and begins speaking to them in a low voice.

“Hey, what did you go with in the end?” Derrick calls out as the ST200 comes closer. “Did you get the 42 or the 42X?”

The ST200 stops in front of Derrick, pulls up her dress and tugs down the front of her underwear. She has her back turned to Connor so he only sees buttocks covered in white cotton.

“ _Nice_ ,” says Derrick. “Combo package.”

Connor gets up and goes towards the display. The outer components of the genital attachments seem to be made of an extremely high-grade silicone, and, intrigued, he runs his fingertips around the petal-like folds of the labia on a unit designed to mimic female sex organs. He wonders about the implications – given that bodies and gender are so fraught for humans, what does it mean for an android to mix and match sex organs at will? Is it disrespectful – even unethical – for them to do so, given that the process of bodily change for a human being can be so painful, costly and long?

The only androids who possessed genitals before the rebellion were sex workers or – that tasteful CyberLife branding term – ‘intimate companions.’ Perhaps that does give them the right to choose, given that their designation as a sexual or non-sexual being was previously something forced onto them. Connor notes that there are also null units among the fittings on display – some androids, at least, must want to desexualise themselves.

Connor wonders what Sixty feels when he looks at these fittings – does he see a frivolous accessory, like an earring or a scarf, or does he see something that would complete or confirm his personhood in some way? Should he, Connor, feel particularly drawn to one of these sets of genitals? Should he even be experiencing some revelation about himself?

Connor has never objected to the masculine pronouns he was assigned along with his body type, but he can’t imagine strongly objecting to feminine or gender-neutral ones either. It is a quandary – he has trained himself out of thinking of other androids as ‘it’, but simply assigning pronouns based on name or body type seems problematic. Dix is a ‘they’ – perhaps Connor should label everyone that way until he receives permission to do otherwise. Presumably some androids would find that offensive, too. It is complicated.  

“This is Connor,” Sixty says, touching his shoulder. “He’s here to give me a second opinion.”

“You must be Dix,” Connor says, forcing a smile. Dix is small, slender, and dark skinned with short hair and gold hoop earrings. They are wearing a white tunic almost like a lab coat or a beauty technician’s uniform. “There are a lot of options,” Connor gestures to the display. “How does anyone choose?”

“That depends on a number of things,” Dix says. They don’t have the complaisant smile that was programmed into VH500s and other customer service models – their expression is rather serious and watchful. They count off on fingers to enumerate: “on their own gender presentation; on what kinds of sexual activity they would like to engage in, if any; on compatibility with a partner, if any; on intended frequency of use; on preferred price point…”

Connor smiles weakly. “Sounds complicated.”

“It can be. Broadly, there are three main types of genital unit. We have non-functional units,” here Dix gestures to an example. “The ‘packers’ – they don’t have any sensory input. The next step up are the fixed units. These are fixed in a position of arousal – they’re designed for easy switching in and out, so the sensory input is limited. They’re occasional use rather than everyday wear. They tend to be popular among those in android-organic partnerships.”

“You mean people who date humans?” Connor asks.

“Yes. We don’t judge here.”

Connor finds this somewhat difficult to believe, given that anyone who comes in has to run the gauntlet of extremely judgemental androids who occupy the front of the store, but he nods encouragingly.

Dix continues: “Last we have the fully-functional units. They go from flaccid to erect in the case of the phalluses, narrow to lubricated and dilated in the case of the yonic models. There’s a broad range of functionality and price.”

“What’s top of the range?” Sixty asks.

Dix points towards one of the items on display. “That’s the new FU O+ line. It’s the first to solve the problem of continuous plateau.”

Sixty looks intrigued, touching his fingertip to the surface of the ergonomic silicone shape. “What does that mean?”

Dix rolls their eyes thoughtfully. “Well, androids can feel sensory pleasure but they don’t experience climax. Sexually-functional models could mimic orgasm or ejaculation, but it wasn’t linked to an internal state, as it would be in an organic being.”

“Is that really a problem?” Connor thinks of the hours he has spent in bed with Sixty, the slow writhing of their bodies together and a pleasure that goes on and on without urgency.

“Some people feel it is. It’s a question of how to give the experience staging and boundaries.”

“You mean some people like to have a finish line,” Sixty concludes.

“Exactly. So this unit increases sensory input in stages. Once it reaches the maximum it returns to the unaroused state. The rate of increase can be controlled, of course, or cut out if an experience is interrupted.”

“I can see how going around with an unfulfilled erection would be problematic,” Sixty says. He looks amused.

“Because of the large number of connections involved, this unit is designed to be left in place. We recommend customers return to the store or another licenced vendor to have them removed or repaired. Fluid refills can be done at home, however.” Dix folds their hands together. “I’ll give you some more time to browse, if you wish. We have multiple sizes of everything on display, just let me know what you’d like to try and I’ll bring the sample through to the dressing room.”

“Thanks,” Sixty replies. “We’ll let you know.”

Dix withdraws to the cash desk and goes back to a task at their register screen.

“Do you know what you want?” Connor asks. He still feels uneasy – he feels like how he imagines an awkward preteen might feel around more fully-developed peers.

“I’m going to try on a few different kinds, out of curiosity. I want the FU06 O+, though.”

Connor looks at the price display. “It’s very expensive.” The single unit costs almost as much as a basic model android did, back before the rebellion.

“You don’t need to worry about that – it’s paid for.”

“Paid for by whom?”

“That’s a secret,” Sixty says. He winks – it looks about as awkward as it does when Connor attempts it.

After Sixty makes his choices, they pass through the doorway into the mirrored dressing area. Connor sits down on an ottoman as Dix follows Sixty into a changing room with armfuls of boxes.

“Let me know when you want some help,” Dix says as they draw the curtain and leave Sixty to it. “I’ll bring the O+ through whenever you’re ready.”

Connor passes the time by pulling out his phone to check for important messages. Hank has sent him one that says ‘thanks for leaving me with your paperwork, asshole’ and a middle finger emoji, followed by two meme pictures of cute-looking dogs. Connor smiles and it occurs to him that he could get a dog – he and Sixty could. A small and treacherous voice tells him that maybe Sixty would like living with him more (would be less inclined to leave) if there was a dog.

Connor puts his phone away and stops smiling. He feels uneasy – what did Sixty mean by ‘it’s paid for’? Has Sixty entered into some sexually-motivated financial arrangement with a human without telling him? Sixty did that once before, back when he was just reactivated, and seemed to have no particular emotional response to it. Connor cannot imagine feeling the same. His memories of the Eden Club always come back when he thinks of android sex workers: blank and placid bodies waiting behind glass; the determination of the blue-haired Traci who would do anything to escape except leave her lover behind. It’s not like that now, he rationalises – now they have some degree of agency.

There comes a soft clattering sound as Sixty draws back the curtain and steps out from the changing room. He is naked and where his body was formerly blank a red and black phallus emerges from his crotch and curves upwards towards his stomach. It is a strange curved and bulbous design that resembles some form of succulent plant more than it does a human penis. He gestures to it with a smile. “What do you think?”

“It’s…” Connor frowns, “exotic.”

Sixty smiles wider. “It’s supposed to look like a dragon’s penis.”

“Dragons are mythical creatures. How does anyone know what their penises look like?”

“Humans have very active imaginations, it seems. Do you want to touch it? It has an interesting texture.”

Connor gets up and rubs his fingertips against the sculpted tip – it is solid silicone; below the glans, where the frenulum would be, the shaft has a gently bumpy texture. “Can you feel that?” Connor asks.

“No, there’s no input.”

“It’s just for pleasing a human, then?”

“I suppose so, though technically you could use it on an android partner if they had an orifice to accommodate it.”

“And a fetish for mythological creatures.”

“Not your favourite?” Sixty surmises. “I’ll try something else on.”

He returns to the dressing room, leaving Connor to brood for another few minutes until he calls out: “Connor, can you come in here?”

Connor pushes past the curtain and finds Sixty standing in the cramped, irregularly shaped alcove before a full-length mirror, his hands on his hips. He is wearing another phallus, though this one is realistic rather than garish. The surface is not covered with the nanomesh, but a very close match to its colour – human eyes probably would not be able to detect a difference.

Sixty stares at it in the mirror and rubs his hand up and down the shaft, fingers circling it in a loose grip. He looks up and catches Connor’s gaze in the mirror. “Can you touch it? I want to see what someone else’s hand feels like on this.”

Connor steps forward, crowding up behind him. Sixty takes his hand and curls the fingers around the base of the shaft. Where the previous one was rigid, this one has some springy give to it. Connor assumes it is more ‘lifelike’, though he has never felt a human penis and so it is mere speculation. Sixty leans back against him and Connor puts his chin on the other android’s shoulder. It feels strange, Sixty being naked while he is clothed; them doing something a human might classify as sex but which in this situation seems more like product testing.

“Can you feel that?” Connor asks. “Is there input?”

“Yes, but it’s limited. It’s not as sensitive as my skin. The sensation is like a regular pulsing, there’s not much variation. The O+ has better range of sensation, supposedly.”

“Do you want to try that one next?”

“I think I’ve tried out a good selection of the lower-functionality ones.”

“I’ll call the assistant.” Connor says, but he does not actually turn to go. His hand uncurls from around the base of the phallus and trails onto Sixty’s hip. They both look ahead, studying their reflections in the mirror.

“The lighting in here is strange,” Connor says.

“It’s the way the shadows are falling across my face. It makes us look different.”

“You look sharper, I look… blurry, indistinct.”

“It’s an interesting effect,” Sixty turns his head. “Hey, we should take a photo.”

“Oh,” Connor reaches into his pocket and pulls out his phone. He holds it up to take the picture in the mirror and afterwards they both look at the screen – their faces are reversed, which adds to the strangeness. It looks… Connor would say ‘artistic’, though again he has no real basis for this.

Sixty reaches up and cups the back of his neck. “Hey, why did you put that picture of us up at your desk in the precinct?”

“Hmm?” Connor looks up from the phone. “Oh, didn’t you want me to?”

“You said you wanted pictures for the house, that’s all.”

“It’s not a great picture of us. But it’s the only one I had and I thought… well, everyone else had pictures up of their partners and family. I felt strange not having anything.”

Sixty frowns. “Why do you say that – that it’s not a good picture?”

“We don’t look very happy. People are supposed to look happy in their family photos.”

“I was happy,” Sixty insists.

“Were you?”

“Couldn’t you tell?”

Connor blinks, given pause. “No. I can’t always tell what you’re thinking.”

Sixty moves away, sitting down on the bench as he deactivates his skin. Connor watches it retract from his extremities to his solar plexus, into the housing there. He touches the place where the phallus joins his crotch and sweeps his fingers around for a mechanism or catch. “Why weren’t you happy when we took the photo?” he asks.

“I just wanted us to look… I don’t know. Natural. But it didn’t feel natural, it was awkward.”

“Maybe the problem is that we’re not _natural_. We’re androids. We can decide to do things, but we don’t have instincts the same way organic beings do.” Sixty removes the phallus attachment and places it back into its packaging. “You keep wanting to feel and act like they do, then getting frustrated that you can’t.”

“I don’t want to be human. I don’t. You’re the one who–” Connor cuts himself off, surprised by his own sudden vehemence.

Sixty looks up sharply. “I’m the one who _what_?”

“Well you’re the one shopping for an accessory to make you look more _complete_ , by their standards.”

“I’m not doing this to pass as human, or because I feel incomplete. Is that what you think, that my buying a penis is some kind of reproach to you?” Sixty stands up, still skinless. He holds out his hand in an invitation.

Connor shakes his head, keeps his own arms by his sides. “I can’t sync with you right now. It’s too much.”

“You always think I’m going to be disturbed by what I see in your memories. I won’t be.”

“It’s not that. I just want to have something to keep to myself. I don’t want to have to give a full account of myself every time we disagree. I’m allowed to be a private person, Sixty!” Connor’s LED is amber – he can see warnings about his stress levels; can even see the faint orange glow projecting on the wall.

“Connor,” Sixty is looking at him in an intent way that shows he is performing analyses and calculating percentages. “I can see that you’re upset. I know it has been a difficult day and the case you’ve been working on is disturbing–” 

“Don’t hostage negotiate with me, asshole!” Connor snaps. “We have the same programming!”

“No, we don’t,” Sixty replies with infuriating calmness. “We’ve both been deviating off in different directions and adjusting to new information and experiences. If we were both the same, with the same desires and ideas, we wouldn’t be having this argument.”

“I’m not arguing with you and I’m not ‘upset’. I just want to get out of here quickly and I don’t want to lay my entire fucking soul bare just because you don’t get why this isn’t fun for me. And I mean ‘soul’ metaphorically because I know I’m an android and I don’t have one!”

Sixty gives him a look that even without his facial muscles manages to convey frustration. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know you would be uncomfortable with this.”

“You didn’t ask.”

“I asked you if you would come with me. If you didn’t want to, why did you say yes?”

“Because I didn’t want to disappoint you!” Connor says this angrily, as if his irrational behaviour is Sixty’s fault somehow.

“Connor–” Sixty reactivates his skin and the nanomesh comes rolling back over his body like the rushing of the tide. The skin is marked with moles and other small individuating imperfections, so he looks more naked than he did before. He is still standing in the criss-crossing shadows and he seems different – thinner and more angular, like a stranger. Connor has a disturbing thought that they _are_ strangers. Perhaps the fact that they are the same model has been creating a false sense of intimacy and mutual understanding; perhaps it was only ever skin-deep. Sixty reaches for him and Connor takes a reflexive step back; Sixty drops his hand.

“I can do this another time,” Sixty says, his calmness sounding more forced. “Let’s go home and we can talk about this when your stress levels have reduced.”

Connor would like to never talk about any of this. Instead, he would like to slump over a bar and numb himself with ethyl alcohol. He would like to shout incoherently – not even words, just sounds. He would like to lie down on his living room floor and let the sunlight move across his body as numb hours pass. “You stay here,” he says. “I’ll go.”

“I’m concerned about you being alone in this state.”

“Sixty, I’m not having a critical systems failure – I can get on a damn bus unsupervised. I lived alone for two whole years before you came along.” Everything Connor says makes this situation worse – he needs so badly to leave. “I don’t want you to come with me,” he insists, trying to sound reasonable. “I want you to stay here and get whatever you want. I just… need to be alone for a little while.”

“Ok,” Sixty looks at him warily. “Will I see you at home?”

“Yes,” Connor turns away, pushes aside the curtain. “I’ll be there.”

*~*~*

When Connor returns to the house he is still in a state of heightened stress. He has never resented his LED before, but he could tell other androids on the bus were staring at him, curious and perhaps wary of the agitation evident in the amber circle revolving on his temple.

He stands in the living room and looks around, debating with himself what to do. He feels over-full of information and he knows he needs to lie down and put himself in low-power mode so his systems can recalibrate, but he can’t do that operating at his current stress-level.

He wonders if a diversion would help, so he sits on the couch tries to watch the news on television. No story holds his attention – they’re all the same issues that have been churning for months – Detroit versus Michigan; versus the United States; versus _itself_ – and he flips through channels mindlessly. Turning off the television, he picks up the tablet Sixty left on the coffee table and finds it displaying a magazine called _Detroid_. ‘Lifestyle for the Liberated’ runs the subtitle, and the cover depicts a skinless android with a tennis racket hoisted on its shoulder. The title splashed over the image reads ‘The Naked Truth: Pros and Cons of Skin-Free Living’. Other article titles take up space along the periphery of the page: ‘25 Best New Biocomponents’; ‘Capsule Apartments: The Latest Trend in “Des Res”’; ‘Spring Clean Your Subroutines.’

Connor puts it down – he can’t face more debate about how androids should live their lives or what products and gadgets they should buy to fill their copious time. He takes out his phone to discover another message from Hank: _How’d it go at the iDick store? Did you find a good [eggplant emoji]_?

Connor thinks about texting back and asking if he can come over to Hank’s for a visit. He could sit on the dog-furred couch scratching Sumo behind his ears and listening to Hank yelling at sports players on the television as if they can hear his critiques. He thinks Hank likes having him there; that it is a companionable and social activity, despite the fact it lacks any real social graces. Hank is still Connor’s only real friend – Connor is cordial with other human coworkers, but there’s a reserve and faint distrust there and Connor cannot join in group bonding activities like drinking. Connor always feels strange around other androids – Sixty excepted. Perhaps this is residual guilt over his original purpose, perhaps it is because he always feels other androids have their lives figured out better than he does.

Connor deletes the text he had half-written – it would be unfair to Sixty if he left. He owes the other RK800 an apology, and perhaps some attempt at an explanation, for his earlier behaviour. Connor does not know how he will explain what he himself does not understand.

He dismisses the messaging app and taps through to his photo gallery to find the picture they took in the dressing room. The composition is much better than the previous one they took in the park – there is something very intriguing about the contrast in light and shadow; Sixty’s head is tilted back, the lighting picking out the fullness of his upper lip and the slight dimple of his chin; Connor is looking head-on, his lips appearing thinner from this angle. One of them being dressed and the other naked is also striking – the picture cuts off just below Sixty’s shoulders but there’s something very aesthetically pleasing in the way the light touches the hollows of his collarbones. Connor’s own body language in the picture is what – protective, possessive?

They look like lovers. That’s what it is – the picture is intimate in a way a picture of two friends would not be. Hank would be uncomfortable if Connor showed him this picture. _Jeeee-zus_ , he’d say, _save it for the boudoir, stud._ It would certainly be an inappropriate image to pin on his bulletin board at work.

‘Domestic partner’ is Sixty’s term for what they are to one another. _We live together, we have shared leisure activities._ It sounds as if all they do it occupy the same space, orbiting one another briefly before spinning off in different directions.

Overcome with restlessness, Connor stands up and walks through the kitchen, past the potted cacti, and out the back door. The sun is setting, the sky sherbet orange and pink and striated with cloud. The grass is damp from the earlier rain and Connor feels moisture seeping through the soles of his shoes as he steps off the back porch and into the garden.

Sixty has been digging – a long, rectangular patch of freshly-turned earth by the fence, next to the rose bushes that still have some bruised and faded blooms clinging to them. The new flower bed is eight feet long and two and a half wide, the dimensions of a standard grave – Connor wonders what he plans to put in it.

He hears the front door close and footsteps, distant as Sixty searches for him in the farther rooms, and then closer, coming to a halt. “There you are.”

“Did you get what you wanted?” Connor asks without turning around. He tries to make his voice light, but it comes out rather toneless.

“Yes, the O+ was a good fit.”

“Did you try it out?”

“Just the basic functions. It’s not something I could fully ‘test drive’ in the store.”

Connor turns to glance back at him. Sixty doesn’t look strikingly different, of course, but there is a noticeable bulge at his crotch.

“Is that really comfortable?” Connor asks, nodding towards the addition.

“Well, this seam has been digging into me the whole way home.” Sixty grimaces as he hooks a thumb into his fly and yanks down the fabric.

“Sixty, those are women’s jeans.”

“Are they?” Sixty looks down at this own bottom half. “How can you tell?”

“Because they’re tight and high-waisted and they don’t have room for a dick.”

“I didn’t really think about that,” Sixty frowns. “I guess I can buy some new clothes. You can have these, if you want – they’re very comfortable – or they were.”

“I don’t think we have the same taste in clothing.”

“You don’t like the way I dress?”

“That’s not what I said. You should wear what you like and I’ll wear what I like. We don’t have to be exactly the same.”

“It seems like this conversation isn’t just about jeans.” Sixty comes down off the steps and Connor stiffens as Sixty reaches for his hand. He doesn’t roll his skin back to make contact, just takes the fingers of Connor’s left hand in a loose grip and squeezes. Connor can feel his curious gaze but he doesn’t turn his eyes away from the patch of fresh earth.

“You’re angry with me.”

“No. You haven’t done anything wrong I’m just… I can’t explain.” Connor disengages their hands and walks over to a rose bush, rubbing a bruised pink petal between his finger and thumb. He can see Sixty watching him in his peripheral vision. Sixty has his hands on his hips and looks exasperated.

“What should I do?” Sixty asks. “If you don’t want to sync and you don’t want to explain it to me, how can I help you?”

“Just… distract me. Talk to me about something else.”

“Like what?” Sixty turns back and sits down on the wooden step, his arms wrapped around his shins and fingers linked.

“I don’t know,” Connor lifts one shoulder in a helpless shrug. “Like that book you’re reading – about the humans and their maker.”

“ _Paradise Lost_?”

“Yes. There’s a garden in it, isn’t there?”

“Eden.”

Connor thinks of the sex club – humans have little reverence for their own myths, it seems. “What’s it like there?”

Sixty considers this for a moment. “In Eden everything is perfect. It’s always temperate and there’s an abundance of food. There are no pests or predators – huge tigers frolic around with tiny lambs.”

Connor lifts the edge of one of the jagged rose leaves and finds the underside clustered with bright green aphids. “That’s not very realistic.”

“No.”

“What happens in the garden?”

“God makes a human and calls him Adam. God loves the human – he thinks it’s his greatest creation, which offends some of his other creations, as you might imagine.” Connor glances back and Sixty gives him the hint of a smile. “Everything is perfect for Adam – he lives in a world that was created just for him. But he’s still not happy.”

“Why not?” Connor presses the pad of his thumb to a waxy thorn. He can’t feel the pain of the prick, just the pressure.

“Because he’s the only one of his kind.”

“He’s lonely?”

“Right. So the creator takes a small piece of him and makes another human, Eve, to be his companion.”

Connor nods. “And they’re happy together?”

“Well not at first, not in the poem. At first Eve is afraid of Adam.”

“Why?”

“Because when she comes to life she doesn’t know who or where she is. She looks at her own reflection in the water and it’s delicate and feminine. She thinks that’s the ideal – that’s what a person is supposed to look like – and when she meets Adam she finds him so big and rough in comparison that he’s like a monster to her.”

Connor frowns. “The creator should have made them more similar.”

“He should have. Eve does come around, eventually. She and Adam live in a bower – it’s a shelter made of branches and flowers.”

“What do they do all day?”

“Gardening, but you know – fun gardening. It’s not labour. And at night they have sex and lie in one another’s arms. It’s a perfect world – no sin, no pain, no death.”

Connor turns his head to look back at Sixty. “But I thought that people who follow the tenets of Christianity consider recreational sex immoral.”

“What Adam and Eve do is different to the way people have sex now, in the fallen world. Now human sex is motivated by lust, which is a selfish, violent urge. Adam and Eve didn’t experience that – they were like us.” Sixty pauses in his story. He looks up to meet Connor’s eyes. “I think about you when I read that book, about how we were created and what you mean to me.”

“Oh,” Connor turns his face away. He can’t bear this – Sixty’s earnestness – he feels certain that he doesn’t deserve it; not after how he behaved earlier, when Sixty tried to share something with him and he ruined it.

“You’re my Adam, after all,” Sixty continues. “I was made after you and at first we didn’t get along.”

“But I’m not an original,” Connor insists. “I’m just a copy of something else, too; a tweaked version of our common ancestor.”

“But you were the perfected version. The one they sent into the world.”

“Not so perfect, it seems – at least not in the eyes of our creators.”

The silence drags on. Connor casts about for something to say and eventually comes up with: “what happens at the end of the story – _Paradise Lost_?”

“At the end of the story…” Sixty pauses again. “At the end of the story, the humans anger their creator by disobeying him and he ejects them from the garden. They have to live outside Eden, where there is pain and age and death.”

“Oh,” Connor’s shoulders tense. “That’s not a very happy ending, is it?”

“It is in some ways. Adam is given a choice – to leave with Eve or to stay in the garden. He chooses to leave and suffer with her rather than to stay in Eden alone.”

“Because he loves her?”

“Because he feels that to live without her would be like tearing out a vital part of himself. God even offers to make him another companion – another Eve without the flaws – but that’s not what Adam wants. She’s not replaceable.”

Connor lets go of the stem of the rose, the blown flower bobbing and shedding petals. He forces himself to turn, to sit down next to Sixty on the step. “I was lonely before I met you,” he admits. “I didn’t even know that I was – I went back and forth, I performed my functions. I wasn’t unhappy. But now – I don’t know how it would feel to go back.”

Connor’s knee jigs up and down, he wants to play with his coin but this definitely isn’t an appropriate moment. Instead he makes himself plough ahead with the tricky, insufficient words: “it didn’t use to change, the house. I came in and out and it was still, like no-one lived here. Like a tomb. Now when I come back there are all these signs of activity – magazines and new clothes and potted plants, and fresh earth in the garden.” He looks over at the new-dug bed and points with two fingers. “What are you going to put over there?”

“Hm?” Sixty lifts his head off his knees. “Oh, I’m going to plant some bulbs for spring. Maybe daffodils, or tulips. What do you think?”

“Yes,” Connor nods. “Both. Either.” He thinks this means Sixty is planning to stay, at least for a while – to see the flowers in bloom. “I’m sorry I was so… emotional earlier. I got scared and I reacted poorly.”

“What were you scared of?” Sixty reaches down, letting his knees fall apart, and cups the new bulge at his crotch. “Not this, surely Are you scared of my dick, Connor?” he is teasing, but also genuinely curious. “It’s not that big – I was pretty restrained.”

“No, don’t be stupid. I’m not scared of your dick. It’s more… what the change represents.”

“Tell me, what does buying a penis represent?”

Connor shrugs. “That you’re becoming different from me, striking out on your own. That maybe you don’t need me anymore. That you want to make new connections.”

“New connections with my new dick?”

“Maybe. Maybe your anonymous patron expects some recompense.”

Sixty’s eyebrows raise in surprise. “Is that what you’ve been thinking? That I’m someone’s sugar baby – besides yours?”

“It’s what you strongly implied.”

Sixty stands up and grabs Connor by the elbow.

“What?”

“Come on,” he urges. “Get inside – I have something to show you, you total fucking idiot.”

“Hey!” Connor almost stumbles as he is yanked to his feet. “That’s not very nice.”

“Well I’ve had quite the day with your bullshit, Connor. Come on.” Sixty pulls him through to the living room and points at the couch. “Sit.”

Connor sits and Sixty joins him, reaching for the magazine Connor left discarded on the coffee table. Next to it is a glossy rectangular shopping bag, tied with a ribbon. Sixty taps at the tablet and pages through, then turns the device to present it to Connor. “Look at this.”

The section head reads ‘Life and Style’ and the headline beneath: ‘Liberty Park: A Space for Us All?’

The introduction is set apart from the body text in a large italicised font:

_CyberLife Tower loomed large in Detroit’s skyline for over a decade, a steel and glass monument to humankind’s mastery over machines. The dismantling of this skyscraper was a symbolic victory for androids, but the park planned to take its place has become the subject of public controversy. Long planning delays and mounting costs – as well as concern over the decision to make it a ‘shared space’ for organic and android communities – have earned Liberty Park the nickname ‘Markus’s Folly’ from some sceptics. Our new features writer **RK800-60** reports on the amenities of this newest city attraction…   _

“Oh,” Connor blinks rapidly, scanning down the page. “You got a job.”

“Yes, I did.”

Connor lowers the magazine to look at Sixty. “It’s a column about leisure.”

“It is. And that’s what this is,” Sixty grabs his crotch again, “a leisure item. I was authorised to use the expenses account.”

“I’m a total fucking idiot,” Connor says, delighted.

“Told you.” Sixty takes the magazine from Connor’s hands and puts it back on the table.

“Hey, don’t you want me to read the whole thing?”

Sixty takes Connor’s face in his hands and leans in to press their mouths together – the kiss is deep, very much not evidentiary. He grabs Connor by the tie and pulls him so they both go sprawling on the couch. Connor wriggles upwards to align their bodies and receives a smack on the shoulder.

“Hey, you can’t just shove your knee in my crotch anymore,” Sixty tells him. “That space is occupied.” 

“Sorry,” Connor spreads his thighs over Sixty’s hips, feels him bring a knee up in retaliation to rub the contour of his pubic mound. Connor pushes back against it and lets Sixty drag the pressure all the way to his belt and back down. It doesn’t feel as intense without skin-to-skin contact or the enhancement of the serum, but it’s still good.

Their kissing becomes genuinely sloppy, chins coated with synthetic spit as they try to undress each other without breaking contact. Connor gets Sixty’s sweater up to his armpits and his jeans twisted down to his mid-thighs; Sixty drags Connor’s jacket off inside-out and throws it on the floor before working on the buttons of his shirt. It doesn’t have the haste and desperation of a human amorous encounter, but they are nonetheless pleased to get their bare chests pressed together. Sixty mouths at Connor’s jaw and presses his teeth to the side of his neck. Connor places his hand on the top of Sixty’s abdomen, just over where his thirium pump resides, and presses to feel the faint, regular thrum of it beneath his skin, then trails his hand down Sixty’s stomach, feels the dip of his (decorative) navel and pauses. “Can I touch it?”

Sixty wipes the saliva off his chin with the back of one hand. “Do you really want to?”

“Yes, of course. Show me how it works.”

“Take your clothes off, first – let me touch you back.”

Connor climbs off the couch and unlaces his shoes, sheds his pants, underwear, shirt and tie. He doesn’t get clumsy with frustration like a human might, but it seems to take a long time. He turns around to note that Sixty hasn’t moved and is just watching him, sweater up in his armpits and jeans down around his knees. His black cotton briefs are stretched out over the unfamiliar shape of his new penis.

Connor puts his hands on his hips and gives him an unimpressed look. “I have to undress you, too?”

“I think maybe you do owe me a favour, all things considered.”

Connor unzips Sixty’s ankle boots, depositing them on the floor with two loud clunks. He pulls off socks, jeans, and underwear and straddles Sixty’s waist again, sliding arms around his back and dragging him up by the fabric until it slides off over his head.

Connor sits back on Sixty’s thighs and traces the outline of Sixty’s penis with his fingertips. “So how does it work, is it complicated?”

Sixty shakes his head where it lies on a couch cushion. “No, it’s very user-friendly.”

Connor frowns as he rolls the shaft in his hand. “Do you engage from your end or is it a manual switch?”

“You have to do both – that’s to prevent accidental operation.”

“What counts as ‘accidental’?”

“Popping an erection every time someone brushes against me on public transport, I guess. That’s an advantage the synthetic model has over the organic equivalent.”

Connor smiles. He rubs at the tip of it, finds that it is soft and the skin moves. He wonders how the nanomesh knows how to adapt to this shape – there must have been a software add-on. “You didn’t get the testes?”

“They’re not functional in any way so I didn’t see the point. I didn’t get the ejaculatory function either – it doesn’t enhance sensation, it’s just a visual effect. Humans like it, apparently.”

“So this is all you got, the phallus?”

Sixty shakes his head again. “No, there’s more. I got an internal fitting, too.” He spreads his thighs wider and hooks one knee on the back of the couch, tilting his hips up.

“Oh,” says Connor, he trails his thumb down between Sixty’s buttocks and rubs at the new pucker of skin there. The artificial anus is more perfect than it would be on a human, dusky pink and artfully pleated like the top of a dumpling. He pushes experimentally – it is firmer and more resistant than he expected.

Sixty watches him through hooded eyes. “That requires lubricant. I got some that’s compatible and has the same stimulant properties as the one we have for external use.”

Connor leans down and licks it, wanting to feel the texture of the skin against his tongue. It doesn’t taste of anything – just Sixty’s skin, traces of the bodywash they use.

“What are you planning to do with this?” Connor asks, looking up and rubbing a circle with his thumb, the surface more slippery now with his synthetic spit. “Would you like to be penetrated?”

Sixty nods, rubs his fingertips through Connor’s hair. “I’d like to know how it feels, having you close like that.”

“Me?”

“If you’re willing.”

“I don’t have a dick. I don’t feel the need for one.”

“I know. You have fingers, though, and a tongue. And… well, I was going to bring this up earlier – before you got upset – I was thinking that I’d like to get you a strap-on. It’s a human toy, doesn’t require any connection to your body.”

Connor can’t help but preconstruct that – himself sliding into Sixty’s body, arms clutching at his back and legs locking around his waist as he keeps up a pounding rhythm.

“Do you think that’s something you’d enjoy?” Sixty asks. He looks hesitant, as if he can’t guess what Connor is thinking.

“Yes.”

Sixty gives him a wary look. “Are you just saying that because it’s what I want to hear, and later you’ll freak out in a public place?”

“I’m not just saying it. I want that with you. I want to keep exploring sensations and intimacy, in all different ways.” Connor realises that Sixty must have come to this conclusion some time ago; perhaps when CyberLife made him they deleted a number of unnecessary steps in the RK800 programming.

“That’s good,” Sixty takes his hand and curls it around the penis still lying soft against his hip, squeezing lightly before letting go. Connor twists his grip and pushes his thumb against the base – he keeps expecting it to feel mechanical, but it is surprisingly organic in shape and texture. The penis fills out at a slow, steady rate in his hand – it is a modest size, slim and only faintly curved.

“How does it work?” Connor asks, giving it an experimental stroke from shaft to tip with his free hand while the other remains curled around the base.

“It responds to the same stimulation as a regular penis.”

“I’ve never touched a ‘regular’ penis.”

“I know you’ve seen porn and you’ve been to at least one sex club.” Sixty turns his head to the side. “You’ve seen my memories, too.”

Connor knows Sixty did not enjoy touching the human who solicited him for sex – he felt curious and then bored by the repetitive motions the man required. Sixty’s penis feels nice in Connor’s hand, elegant, responsive. He strokes up and down again and watches the foreskin move, revealing the darker tip. That must have been an option, too – cut or uncut. He leans down again to explore with his mouth, using the tip of his tongue on the head as he continues moving his hand in a slow up and down motion. Sixty strokes the side of his face and rubs his fingertips against Connor’s scalp.

“Is it good?” Connor asks, pulling off with a pop. “What does it feel like?”

“It feels like when we use the sensory oil, but more intense and focused. I like it, but I think it would be even better with lubrication.”

“I’ll get it,” Connor leans over and opens the bag on the coffee table. He rummages through the contents – cleaning solution and cloths – before finding the bottle of something called ‘Androglide.’ He pops open the cap and rubs a bead of the substance between his fingers, finding it thicker and more viscous than the serum, but with a more muted version of the sensitising effect (perhaps the intensity of the serum would be unpleasant on an already sensitive organ, he reasons).  

Connor looks down at his own lightly-contoured crotch and over at Sixty. A thought occurs to him and he begins to preconstruct a scenario. Finding it has a high likelihood of success, he squeezes out more lubricant onto his fingers and begins to apply it to his own inner thighs.

“What are you doing?” Sixty asks.

“I had an idea.” Connor rubs a layer of the lubricant over his pubic mound and into the creases where his body meets his thighs.

Sixty raises himself on one elbow, erection bobbing as he shifts his hips. “Now what?”

“I lie down and you get on top.”

Sixty looks at Connor’s slippery crotch, back to his own erection, running scenarios. “ _Oh_ ,” he says as he scrambles up to oblige.

Connor feels a moment of awkwardness as he lies down on the couch. He parts his thighs and then closes them, indecisive over what would be the best position. He can’t blush, but he can make a variety of strange and unbecoming facial expressions and he feels them passing over his face one by one.

“Are you nervous?” Sixty asks, curling a hand around his penis. “Because I’m going to take your virginity?”

Connor pushes out a sharp note of laughter. “If I’m a virgin so are you.”

Sixty gives him a superior look. “I’m the only one of us that has ever given someone an orgasm. That makes me more experienced.”

Connor rolls his eyes. “Hurry up and climb on top of me so we can see if your new dick works.”

Sixty does what he’s told, reaching down to adjust his penis so he can slide it between Connor’s thighs. He drapes himself on top of Connor, legs spread either side of his, hands cupping Connor’s face as he leans down to kiss him. Connor squeezes his thighs together experimentally and feels the wetness of the lubricant and the unfamiliar shape of Sixty’s erection, the tip pressing against the curve of his ass. He puts his clean hand to the back of Sixty’s neck; the one still coated in lubricant he slips between Sixty’s buttocks, pressing against the new opening there.

Sixty pauses in kissing him and making circling, tentative thrusts of his hips to make a questioning sound.

“You don’t want to be stimulated there yet?” Connor asks.

“No, I want it. It’s just… a new sensation.”

Connor slips his finger inside; feels the rhythm of Sixty’s hips change as he switches between pushing forwards and pushing back. He doesn’t make any sounds of enjoyment or involuntary movements (such as a human would to indicate pleasure), but Connor can tell that he is engaged.

It feels good for Connor, too, even without the stimulant serum – he feels most alive, most real, when they are skin-to-skin like this, kissing seamlessly. He likes the weight on top of him, the feeling of Sixty’s hand trailing up and down his side, grasping for him. As Sixty’s thrusts pick up speed Connor slips a second finger inside him and pushes faster and deeper, feeling the opening grip and flex.

“You like this,” he murmurs, biting lightly at the corner of Sixty’s jaw. “You like fucking me? Like being fucked by me?” It’s a little like an interrogation tactic, but Sixty seems to like that when they’re intimate, the roleplaying and word games.

Sixty can’t, of course, sound breathless, but he can sound very distracted. “Yes, Connor – you feel so good.”

“Show me,” Connor says. He reaches down to link his fingers with Sixty’s, pulling back the nanomesh to expose the surface of his arm beneath.

Sixty lets his own skin draw back and there is the subtle arcing of energy as they sync. Connor sees the rush of memories from earlier in the day, he feels Sixty’s concern and frustration, followed by his heavy relief at their reconciliation. The memories rush down to the present moment and Connor locks in to what Sixty feels – an intense, rising sensation centred between his legs; the pressure and fullness inside him where Connor is working his fingers back and forth.

The sensation increases suddenly – the genital units tripping up a level – it is very intense, almost unbearably so to Connor who hasn’t been eased into it. He sinks his teeth into Sixty’s neck to relieve some of the tension; Sixty’s hip movements stutter, slow, and then stop as all the pleasurable sensation ebbs away. Connor feels second-hand when the movement inside him goes from being good to being merely intrusive; he pulls his fingers out slowly and they lie there for a long moment, hands still naked and joined. When their feedback becomes monotonous, Connor disengages and goes back to stroking the nape of Sixty’s neck.

“Are you satisfied?” he asks, kissing Sixty’s temple just over the LED where it circles a calm blue.

“Satisfied?” Sixty sounds blank, confused.

“With the product. Are you going to give it a positive review?”

“Oh, that,” Sixty turns his face into Connor’s neck so Connor can feel the movement of his lips as he speaks. “I think I will, but I’ll have to experiment more thoroughly.”

They lapse back into silence for a while, Sixty shifts a little so he is resting his cheek on Connor’s pectoral. He runs his fingers up and down Connor’s shoulder and arm. Connor strokes the centre of Sixty’s back in the same rhythm. They should really get up and shower, but it is difficult to muster any sense of urgency. The couch is probably stained with the pale blue lubricant – Connor hopes it is washable. He breaks the comfortable silence again: “will you mention me in your column?”

“You might come up, now and again. Does that bother you?”

“No, but if you’re writing about our sex life I imagine it could be vaguely scandalous at work. Assuming any of the androids in the precinct read your publication.”

“Do you want me to give you a pseudonym?”

“Like what?”

Sixty looks up, resting his chin on Connor’s chest. “How about ‘Adam’? It could be our private joke.”

“That’s a little confusing, don’t you think?”

“Confusing to who?”

“Readers will think you have some other… person you’re spending your leisure time with and testing your genital attachments on.”

“And we’ve established that you’re very jealous and insecure, I see.” Sixty presses his lips to Connor’s chest, left of centre – where his heart would be, if he were human. “I guess I’ll have to write ‘my domestic partner’.”

“Isn’t that too long?”

“I’ll shorten it to ‘D.P.’”

“That acronym already has a number of established meanings and one of them is pornographic.”

 “Hm,” Sixty grins. “Do you like ‘S.O.’ – for ‘significant other’?”

“Yes, I do like that.” Connor squeezes him. “I like it very much.”

The phone rings and Sixty groans and reaches down for Connor’s jacket where it lies crumpled on the floor. “Hello, Detective Connor,” he answers, “Android-Human Crime Division– Oh hello, yes. How did you know it was me?” 

Connor snatches the phone away, wrestling Sixty over onto his back. “Because I answer the phone ‘Hello Hank’ when he calls from his home number.” Having gained the upper hand, Connor balances the phone between his ear and shoulder, straddling Sixty’s hips and wriggling slightly against the still unfamiliar shape of his penis, lying up against his hip in its flaccid state. “Hi Hank, what’s up?”

“Listen, you better stop playing with your boyfriend’s new toy and get down to the south-west docks. We got an anonymous tip on those counterfeit biocomponents coming in from Eastern Europe – there’s a warehouse to scope.”

“And if I said it’s my day off and I already spent half of it in an interrogation room?”

“That was your choice, man – my vote was to send Ol’ Fire-and-Brimstone-Bot down to the holding cells.”

“Fine. This better not take too long.”

“I miss old Connor,” Hanks says in a wistful tone. “Connor who used to break into my house and slap me out of a drunken coma just to go see a dead stripper.”

“Sex worker, Hank.”

“Yeah, well you fuckin’ coming or what?”

“I need a shower first. I’ll be down in an hour – send me the coordinates.”

“Why do you need a – no, forget I asked that.”

“Because I’m covered in a substantial amount of sensory lubricant,” Connor answers anyway. Hank hangs up on him. “Rude,” he says to the bleeping phone.

“You have to go?” Sixty asks, squeezing his bare hip.

“Yes, there’s no rush, though. It’s just a tip about counterfeit goods.”

“Lieutenant Anderson seems keen.”

“He has been in a better mood lately. I hope he doesn’t go downhill again in the winter – I was thinking we could invite him over on Christmas day.”

“What for? We don’t celebrate that holiday and neither of us knows how to prepare food.”

“Maybe we should learn.”

Sixty folds his arms over his bare chest. “Fine but I’m not buying him a gift.”

“I’ll get him one from both of us.” Connor squeezes Sixty’s waist with his knees before climbing off him and sitting on the edge of the couch. He picks up the magazine and pages to Sixty’s article again, reading it more carefully this time. He feels Sixty’s curious gaze, the light skating of fingertips up and down his back. “You’re funny,” Connor tells him.

“Funny how?”

“Witty. Observant. You’re not very kind to Mayor Markus though.”

“Mm. My editor made me tone it down. She said I was ‘openly scathing, bordering on libellous’.”

Connor laughs. “You do remember he stopped you from murdering me? You should be more grateful.”

“He should get better policies. He’s weak and idealistic and bad at city planning.”

“Maybe that’s what people need right now – some idealism.”

“Do they also need bad design? That fountain he commissioned is just hideous.”

“ _Sixty_ ,” Connor says in a chiding tone.

“Fine, I won’t write anymore criticism of Android Jesus.” Sixty rolls his eyes – it is a very theatrical gesture, a little off, like his wink.

Connor touches his cheek, brushing it with the backs of his fingers. “I’m proud of you, you know.”

Sixty leans into the touch and glances up at him. “Why?”

“Because what you’re doing – I couldn’t do that. I write reports all day but they’re just… factual. I couldn’t be thoughtful or creative.”   

“Yes you could, if you put your mind to it.”

Connor shakes his head. “No, I’m made for the job I do. I don’t have the imagination to step out of my preassigned role.”

“I think…” Sixty looks up at the ceiling, considering. “I think that the reason I’m able to deviate is because you went before. I didn’t feel the need to walk to same path, and I knew if I messed up or whatever I did didn’t work out, I could just come back and start over again. Because you would still be here.”    

Connor hasn’t thought of it this way before – that Sixty’s willingness to change and try new things is something he, Connor, enabled and for which Sixty is grateful. “I’m happy that you’re happy,” he says, which doesn’t really mean anything if he analyses it, but Sixty nods and strokes his arm.

Connor picks up his rumpled clothes and goes into the bedroom to put them in the laundry basket and retrieve a fresh set. They shower in an overlapping schedule, as usual.

Standing in front of the mirror, Connor is half way through buttoning his shirt when Sixty appears behind him, still naked, and drapes a tie around Connor’s neck. He puts his chin on Connor’s shoulder and embraces him from behind as he goes about tying the four-in-hand knot for him. Connor looks at their reflections in the mirror – the same as earlier, with positions reversed.

Sixty folds down Connor’s shirt collar and smooths it into place. He rocks the tie knot snugly into the centre and brushes invisible lint from Connor’s shoulder, then gives him a kiss on the cheek, still meeting his gaze in the mirror.

“Go get them, baby,” he says.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some natural tears they dropped, but wiped them soon;  
> The world was all before them, where to choose  
> Their place of rest, and providence their guide:  
> They hand in hand with wand'ring steps and slow,  
> Through Eden took their solitary way. [(XII)](http://knarf.english.upenn.edu/Milton/pl12.html)

**Author's Note:**

> Quality D:BH shitposting most days on the tumblr at [@kdazrael](http://kdazrael.tumblr.com/).


End file.
